33f6 
T77k 


Trumbull 


Historical  Notes  on  the 
Constitutions  of  Connecticut 


HISTORICAL 

NOTES 

r\N  the  Constitutions  of 

Connecticut  and  on  CJje 

Constitutional  Contention  of  i  8  i  8 

By  J.  HAMMOND  TRUMBULL 


Printed  by  Order  of  the  Comptroller  1901 


HISTORICAL  NOTES 

O  N 

The  Constitutions  of 
Connecticut 


639    -    1  8  1  8 


PARTICULARLY 

On  the  Origin  and  Progress  of  the  Movement 
which  resulted  in  the  Convention  of  181 8 
and  the  Adoption  of  the  Present  Constitution 


By   J.    Hammond    Trumbull 


H  A  R  T  FORD: 

Printed  by  Order  of  the  Comptroller 

1901 


Hartford  Press: 
The  Case,  Lockwood  &  Brainard  Company 

I  9  o  i 


K 
T77-K, 


State  of  Connecticut, 
Comptroller's  Office, 

Hartford,  December,    1901. 

The  Historical  Notes  on  the  Constitutions  of  Con- 
necticut, published  in  1873  by  the  late  J.  Hammond 
Trumbull,  LL.D.,  recognized  as  an  authority  and  an 
invaluable  help  to  the  clear  understanding  of  the  history 
of  our  existing  Constitution,  is  now  out  of  print. 

By  the  kind  permission  of  the  family  of  the  late 
historian,  I  am  enabled  to  publish  this  edition,  realizing 
its  value  at  this  time,  on  the  eve  of  the  Constitutional 
Convention  of  1902. 

A.  CHAMBERLAIN, 

Comptroller. 


Publication   No.    2 
necticut  Constitutions 
Series 


20124;; 


THE  following-  historical  sketch  was  written,  some  twelve 
years  ago,  by  way  of  introduction  to  a  projected  edition 
of  the  Constitution  of  1818,  with  the  Journal  of  the  Con- 
vention by  which  it  was  formed,  extracts  from  the  Debates  re- 
ported in  the  newspapers  of  the  time,  and  notes  showing  the 
origin  and  authorship  of  the  several  sections,  the  intent  of  the 
framers,  and  something  of  the  secret  history  of  particular  pro- 
visions and  of  the  motives  which  influenced  individual  members 
of  the  Convention  to  advocate  or  to  oppose  their  incorporation 
with  the  Constitution.  The  work  was  laid  aside,  till  I  should 
have  leisure  —  which  now  it  seems  unlikely  that  I  shall  ever 
find  —  to  revise  and  complete  it.  The  fact  that  the  Journal  of 
the  Convention  has  just  been  printed  by  order  of  the  General 
Assembly,  and  the  interest  which  is  everywhere  manifested  in 
the  proposition  to  call  another  convention  to  amend  the  present 
constitution  or  to  frame  a  new  one,  may  perhaps  serve  as  an 
apology  for  the  publication  of  this  sketch,  unfinished  and  im- 
perfect as  it  is. 

J.  H.  T. 
Hartford,  Conn.,  July  1st,  1873. 


Historical  Notes  on  the  Consti- 
tutions ^Connefticut,  1639-18 18 

THE  constitutional  history  of  Connecticut  properly 
begins  with  the  adoption,  on  the  fourteenth  of 
January,  1638-39,  of  the  "  Fundamental  Orders," 
by  which  "  the  inhabitants  and  residents  of  Wind- 
sor, Hartford,  and  Wethersfield  "  became  "asso- 
ciated and  conjoined  to  be  as  one  Public  State  or  Common- 
wealth," for  the  establishment  of  "  an  orderly  and  decent  gov- 
ernment, according  to  God,  to  order  and  dispose  of  the  affairs 
of  the  people  at  all  seasons  as  occasion  shall  require."1 

At  the  first  settlement  of  the  colony  a  provisional  government 
had  been  instituted,  under  a  commission  from  the  General  Court 
of  Massachusetts  (March  3,  1636),  to  eight  of  the  persons  who 
;'  had  resolved  to  transplant  themselves  and  their  estates  unto 
the  River  Connecticut":2  "that  commission  taking  rise  from 
the  desire  of  the  people  that  removed,  who  judged  it  incon- 
venient to  go  away  without  any  frame  of  government,  —  not 
from  any  claim  of  the  Massachusetts  of  jurisdiction  over  them 
by  virtue  of  Patent."3  It  was,  in  fact,  an  agreement,  ratified  in 
the  presence  of  the  Massachusetts  general  court,  between  the 
founders  of  Connecticut  and  the  representatives  of  the  Earl  of 
Warwick's  grantees,  who,  as  the  instrument  sets  forth,  had 
"  sometime  engaged  themselves  and  their  estates  in  the  planting 
of  the  river  of  Connecticut,"  and  had  already  made  a  beginning 
at  Saybrook.  '  That  some  present  government  may  be  ob- 
served," Roger  Ludlow,  William  Pynchon,  John  Steele,  William 


'Conn.    Records,   i.   20-25.  "Mass.    Records,    i.    170. 

'  Rei  of  Comm'rs  of  N.   England;    Hazard,   ii.    no   (corrected  by 

MS.   Records). 


8  BEGINNINGS    OF    GOVERNMENT. 

Swaine,  Henry  Smith,  William  Phelps,  William  Westwood,  and 
Andrew  Ward,  —  two  from  each  of  the  plantations  afterwards 
named  Windsor,  Hartford,  Wethersfield,  and  Springfield,  — 
were  authorized  to  hold  courts  for  the  trial  of  civil  causes,  to 
punish  offenders,  and  to  make  orders  "  for  the  peaceable  and 
quiet  ordering  the  affairs  of  the  said  plantations."  But  it  was 
expressly  provided  "  that  this  commission  shall  not  extend  any- 
longer  time  than  one  year  from  the  date  thereof." 

The  first  "  General  Court "  —  in  which  the  river  towns  were 
represented  by  their  "  committees  "  —  was  held  on  the  first  day 
of  May,  1637. 4  No  reference  to  the  election  of  magistrates  or 
committees  appears  on  the  records  until  the  following  year, 
when  at  the  close  of  the  session  of  February  9th,  it  was 

"  Ordered  that  the  general  court  now  in  being  shall  be  dis- 
solved, and  there  is  no  more  attendance  of  the  members  thereof 
to  be  expected  except  they  be  newly  chosen  in  the  next  general 
court."5 

There  are  records  of  two  sessions  of  the  general  court,  March 
8th  and  April  5th,  1638,  in  both  of  which  the  names  of  Mr. 
Pynchon  and  Mr.  Smith  of  Springfield  (Agawam)  appear  in  the 
roll  of  magistrates  present.6  In  the  April  court  that  plantation 
was  represented  also  by  "  committees."  A  letter  of  the  Rev. 
Thomas  Hooker,  written  in  the  autumn  of  1638,  supplies  an 
omission  in  the  records,  by  showing  how  the  general  court  was 
at  this  period  constituted,  and  under  what  obligation  the  magis- 
trates were  invested  with  authority: 

"  At  the  time  of  our  election,  the  committees  from  the  town  of 
Agawam  came  in  with  other  towns,  and  chose  their  magistrates, 
installed  them  into  their  government,  took  oath  of  them  for  the 
execution  of  justice  according  to  God,  and  engaged  themselves 
to  submit  to  their  government,  and  the  execution  of  justice  by 
their  means  and  dispensed  by  the  authority  which  they  put  upon 
them  by  choice."7 

The  germ  of  the  first  written  Constitution  —  the  voluntary 
compact  of  January,  1639,  of  which  the  Charter  of  1662,  the 
declaration  of  State  independence  in  1776,  and  the  Constitution 
of  1818,  were  the  necessary  outgrowths  —  may  be  found  in  a 
sermon  preached  by  Mr.  Hooker  before  the  general  court  in 
May,  1638:8  "The  foundation  of  authority  is  laid,  firstly,  in  the 

*  Conn.    Col.    Records,   i.   9.  B  Ibid.,   i.    12. 

'Ibid.,  i.  13,  17.  7  Coll.  Conn.  Hist.  Soc,  i.  13.  8  Ibid.,  20. 


MR.    HOOKERS    VIEW    OF    CIVIL    GOVERNMENT.  9 

free  consent  of  the  people.  .  .  .  The  choice  of  public  magis- 
trates belongs  unto  the  people,  by  God's  own  allowance.  .  .  . 
They  who  have  power  to  appoint  officers  and  magistrates,  it  is 
in  their  power,  also,  to  set  the  bounds  and  limitations  of  the  power 
and  place  unto  which  they  call  them." 

A  few  months  later,  Mr.  Hooker,  writing  to  Governor  Win- 
throp,  of  Massachusetts,  cited  "  the  old  rule,  Quod  ad  omncs 
spectat,  ab  omnibus  debet  approbari,"  and  avowed  his  conviction 
that,  "  on  matters  of  greater  consequence,  which  concern  the 
common  good,  a  general  counsel,  chosen  by  all,  to  transact 
businesses  which  concern  all,"  is  "  most  suitable  to  rule,  and 
most  safe  for  relief  of  the  whole."  But,  he  argues,  it  is  not 
enough  that  the  people  exercise  their  right  of  choosing  their 
counselors  and  judges ;  "  the  question  here  grows  —  what  rule 
the  judge  must  have  to  judge  by."  There  must  be  established 
law,  "  to  have  chief  rule  over  rulers  themselves."  '  That  in  the 
matter  which  is  referred  to  the  judge,  the  sentence  should  lie  in 
his  breast,  or  be  left  to  his  discretion,  according  to  which  he 
should  go,  —  I  must  confess,"  wrote  Hooker,  "  I  ever  looked 
at  it  as  a  way  which  leads  directly  to  tyranny,  .  .  .  and  must 
plainly  profess,  if  it  was  in  my  liberty,  I  should  choose  neither 
to  live  nor  leave  my  posterity  under  such  a  government."9  And 
in  this  declaration  is  suggested,  not  doubtfully,  the  motive  which 
impelled  Hooker  and  his  associates  to  withdraw  from  the  juris- 
diction of  Massachusetts  and  to  found  a  new  colony  in  the  valley 
of  the  Connecticut.  For  in  Massachusetts,  though  "  the  people 
had  long  desired  a  body  of  laws,  and  thought  their  condition  very 
unsafe  while  so  much  power  rested  in  the  discretion  of  magis- 
trates," "  great  reasons  there  were  which  caused  most  of  the 
magistrates  and  some  of  the  elders  not  to  be  very  fortvard  in  this 
matter."10  Governor  Winthrop  himself  believed  that  the  magis- 
trate was  sufficiently  bound  by  his  oath  of  office  and  his  church 
covenant,  though  he  pronounce  "  not  by  any  rule  particularly 
prescribed  by  civil  authority,"  and  moreover,  he  was  firmly  per- 
suaded of  "  the  unwarrantableness  and  unsafeness  of  referring 
matter  of  counsel  or  judicature  to  the  body  of  the  people,  quia, 
the  best  part  is  always  the  least,  and  of  that  best  part  the  wiser 
part  is  always  the  lesser."1 

The  Constitution  of  1630,  vested  "the  supreme  power  of  the 

•Coll.  Conn.   Hist.  Society,  i.   II.      10  Winthrop's  History,  i.  322. 
'  [bid.,  ii.  350;  Reply  to  Vane,  1637,  in  Hutchinson's  Collection,  98. 


IO  THE    FIRST    CONSTITUTION. 

commonwealth  '*  in  a  *'  general  court  "  to  be  composed  of  the 
governor,  magistrates,  and  deputies  from  the  several  towns.  It 
provided  for  the  annual  election,  by  a  major  vote  of  "the  whole 
body  n\  freemen,"  by  ballot,  of  a  governor  and  magistrates,  who, 
after  being  severally  sworn,  in  prescribed  form,  were  empowered 
"  to  administer  justice  according  to  the  laws  here  established, 
and  for  want  thereof  according  to  the  word  of  God."  Only  free- 
men of  the  commonwealth  were  eligible  to  the  magistracy,  and 
the  governor  must  be  "  a  member  of  some  approved  congrega- 
tion, and  formerly  of  the  magistracy."  No  person  might  be  re- 
elected governor  "  above  once  in  two  years,"  and  no  person 
might  be  chosen  a  magistrate  unless  placed  in  nomination  at  a 
previous  general  court. 

"Two  general  assemblies  or  courts"  must  be  held  yearly; 
the  first,  in  April,  to  be  the  "  Court  of  Election."  If  the  gover- 
nor and  magistrates  should  at  any  time  neglect  or  refuse  to  call 
either  of  these  two  "  standing  courts,  or  a  special  session  of  the 
court,"  when  the  occasions  of  the  Commonwealth  require,  a  ma- 
jority of  the  freemen  might  issue  summons,  meet  together, 
choose  a  moderator,  and  exercise  all  the  powers  of  a  general 
court.  No  court  might  be  adjourned  or  dissolved  without  the 
consent  of  a  majority  of  its  members. 

Each  of  the  three  towns  —  Springfield  having  already  with- 
drawn from  the  jurisdiction  of  Connecticut  —  was  authorized  to 
send  four  deputies  to  every  general  court.  The  deputies  must  be 
freemen  of  the  commonwealth,  but  in  the  choice  of  deputies 
(which  must  be  by  ballot)  all  who  had  been  admitted  inhabitants 
of  the  town,  and  had  taken  the  oath  of  fidelity,  might  vote. 
"  And  whatsoever  other  towns  shall  hereafter  be  added  to  this 
jurisdiction,  they  shall  send  so  many  deputies  as  the  Court  shall 
judge  meet,  a  reasonable  proportion  to  the  number  of  freemen 
that  are  in  the  said  towns  being  to  be  attended  therein."  Only 
the  general  court  had  the  power  to  admit  freemen,  —  residence 
within  the  jurisdiction  and  previous  admission  as  an  inhabitant 
of  one  of  the  towns  being  the  only  qualifications  required  by 
the  constitution. 

The  deputies  wrere  authorized  to  meet  by  themselves,  before 
the  meeting  of  the  general  court,  "  to  advise  and  consult  of  all 
such  things  as  may  concern  the  good  of  the  public,"  and  to  in- 
quire into  the  legality  of  the  election  of  any  of  their  number;  the 


THE    FIRST    CONSTITUTION.  II 

authority  of  final  decision  that  an  election  was  illegal,  being  re- 
served to  the  court. 

The  governor  was  sworn  to  "  promote  the  public  good  and 
peace,"  "  to  maintain  all  lawful  privileges  of  this  Common- 
wealth," to  execute  "  all  wholesome  laws  that  are  or  shall  be 
made  by  lawful  authority  here  established,"  and  to  "  further  the 
execution  of  justice  according  to  the  rules  of  God's  word."  Sim- 
ilar obligations  were  imposed  by  the  oath  prescribed  for  magis- 
trates.2 Every  freeman  must  acknowledge  himself  "  subject  to 
the  government  of  the  jurisdiction  of  Connecticut,"  and  must 
swear  "  to  be  true  and  faithful  unto  the  same,"  to  submit  per- 
son and  estate  thereunto,  and  "  neither  to  plot  nor  practise  any 
evil  against  the  same."3 

t 

The  power  to  make  and  repeal  laws,  to  levy  taxes,  to  admit 
freemen,  and  to  dispose  of  unappropriated  lands,  was  exclu- 
sively in  the  general  court,  which  also  "  shall  have  power  to  call 
either  court  or  magistrate,  or  any  other  person  whatsoever,  into 
question  for  any  misdemeanor,  and  may  for  just  causes  displace, 
or  deal  otherwise,  according  to  the  nature  of  the  offence." 

One  peculiarity  of  this  earliest  Constitution  must  not  be  over- 
looked. The  only  allegiance  it  exacts  is  to  "  the  government  of 
the  jurisdiction  of  Connecticut;  "  the  only  "  supreme  authority  " 
it  recognizes  is  that  of  "  the  body  of  the  freemen  and  the  general 
court  in  which  they  are  represented  by  their  deputies;  it  demands 
obedience  to  no  laws  except  such  as  "  are  or  shall  be  made  by 
lawful  authority  here  established  —  and  for  want  thereof,  the 
rule  of  the  word  of  God."  There  is  no  word  or  hint  of  submis- 
sion to  any  sovereign  power  not  directly  exercised  by  or  pro- 
ceeding from  the  people.  Connecticut  was  already  an  inde- 
pendent republic. 

The  right  to  alter  or  add  to  the  Fundamental  Orders,  though 
not  explicitly  affirmed,  was  understood  to  remain  with  the  free- 
men in  general  court  assembled.  It  was  repeatedly  exercised 
between  1639  and  1662.  In  1645,  it  was  ordered  that  a  lawful 
court  might  be  held  by  the  Governor  or  Deputy  and  three  other 
magistrates   (instead   of  the   Governor  or   Moderator  and  four 

2  Conn.    Col.    Rec,   i.    25,   26.  "Ibid.,   o_>,   63.     The   oath   of  a    free- 

man was  not  recorded  —  and  perhaps  its  form  was  not  prescribed- — till 
April,  [640, 


12  THE    CHARTER    OF    1662. 

magistrates)  with  a  majority  of  all  the  deputies  chosen,  but  "  no 
act  shall  pass  or  stand  for  a  law  which  is  not  confirmed  both  by 
the  major  part  of  the  said  magistrates  and  by  the  major  part  of 
the  deputies  there  present  in  court,  both  magistrates  and  deputies 
being  allowed,  either  of  them,  a  negative  vote  "  on  the  action  of 
the  others.4  At  the  Court  of  Election  in  1646,  "  the  Freemen 
ordered  "  a  change  in  the  time  of  holding  the  Court  thereafter  — 
from  April  to  May.5  In  May,  1647,  tne  Governor  or  deputy  and 
two  magistrates  were  authorized  to  hold  "  particular  courts  "  for 
the  administration  of  justice  when  occasion  should  require.6  In 
April,  1660,  —  just  before  the  expiration  of  John  Winthrop's  first 
year  of  office  as  governor  —  the  general  court  "propounded  to 
the  consideration  of  the  freemen,"  an  alteration  of  the  funda- 
mental law  which  prohibited  the  election  of  the  same  person  as 
governor  in  two  successive  years,  and  at  the  ensuing  Court  of 
Election,  "  it  was  voted  by  the  freeman  "  that  "  for  the  future 
there  shall  be  liberty  of  a  free  choice  yearly,  either  of  the  same 
person  or  another."7 

In  two  or  three  instances  the  general  court  gave,  and  estab- 
lished by  law,  a  new  construction  of  some  provision  of  the  Funda- 
mental Laws.  In  1643,  the  court  "  declare  their  judgment  "  that 
those  only  shall  be  deemed  "  admitted  inhabitants  "  who  shall  be 
so  admitted  "  by  a  vote  of  the  major  part  of  the  town  that  receiv- 
eth  them,"  and  again  in  1657,  the  court  ordered  "  that  by  ad- 
mitted inhabitants  in  the  7th  Fundamental,  arc  meant  only  house- 
holders that  are  one  and  twenty  years  of  age,  or  have  borne 
office,  or  have  thirty  pounds'  estate."8 

The  Charter  procured  from  Charles  II.  (April  23,  1662,)  was 
not  regarded  as  a  grant  of  new  powers,  but  as  a  formal  recogni- 
tion of  the  government  already  established  by  the  people  and  a 
confirmation  of  the  rights  and  privileges  they  had  exercised  from 
the  first.  As  a  guaranty  of  their  title  to  the  soil  and  a  safeguard 
of  their  liberties  against  the  aggression  of  neighboring  govern- 
ments and  the  possible  encroachment  of  the  Crown,  —  as  an  ad- 
mission of  the  colony's  virtual  independence  of  king  or  parlia- 
ment, in  all  that  concerned  internal  administration  of  govern- 
ment, —  the  royal  charter  was  a  precious  gift,  and  came  to  be  the 

4  Conn.    Col.    Rec,   i.    119.  "Ibid.,   140.  6  Ibid.,   150. 

'  Conn.   Col.   Rec,   i.   346,  347.  8  Ibid.,  96,  293. 


THE   PEOPLE'S  —  RATHER   THAN    THE   KING'S  —  CHARTER.     13 

object  of  almost  superstitious  regard.  But  it  did  not  in  any  way 
affect  the  relations  previously  established  between  the  people 
and  their  chosen  rulers.  The  frame  of  government  continued  to 
rest  on  the  same  broad  foundation  on  which  the  Constitution  of 
1639  had  placed  it,  and  "  the  supreme  power  of  the  Common- 
wealth "  was  made  to  consist,  as  before,  in  the  general  court. 

The  first  draft  of  the  charter  itself,  so  far  as  it  affected  the  lib- 
erties of  the  colony,  was  in  fact  prepared  by  the  general  court  in 
Hartford,  and  the  colony's  agent  was  instructed  that  the  patent 
to  be  procured  should  comprehend  "  all  the  rights,  privileges, 
authority  and  immunities  that  are  granted  in  the  Massachusetts 
colony's  patent."  Two  or  three  lines  which  were  finally  erased 
from  these  instructions  to  Winthrop  show,  more  clearly  perhaps 
than  any  clause  of  the  perfected  draft,  in  what  light  the  general 
court  regarded  the  object  of  the  petition  they  preferred  "  to  the 
King's  majesty:  "  "  But  if  it  cannot  be  granted  that  the  bounds 
[of  the  colony's  jurisdiction]  may  extend  at  least  to  Hudson's 
River,  we  do  not  judge  it  requisite  to  expend  money  upon  a  Patent."9 
The  King  was  petitioned  to  bestow  his  royal  favor  and  grace 
"  according  to  the  tenor  of  a  draft  or  instrument  "  that  the  Court 
submitted  for  his  formal  approval.10  In  this  view,  "  it  was  not 
a  charter  of  King  Charles,  but  a  charter  of  the  people  ";  and  under 
it  the  people  exercised  all  the  powers  of  government,  and  en- 
joyed as  much  freedom  as  had  ever  fallen  to  the  lot  of  any  com- 
munity. "  The  application  of  the  people  for  the  charter  and  their 
voluntary  acceptance  of  it,  gave  efficiency  to  the  government  it 
constituted,  —  and  not  the  royal  signature,"2  —  in  the  judgment 
of  those  who  enjoyed  the  privileges  it  recognized  and  affirmed. 

When  the  American  colonies  declared  their  independence  of 
Great  Britain,  the  royal  and  provincial  governments  were  thereby 
dissolved,  but  that  of  Connecticut  remained  unchanged.  The 
General  Assembly  in  October,  1776,  after  recording  their  ap- 
proval of  the  Declaration  of  July  4th,  and  resolving  "  that  this 
Colony  is  and  of  right  ought  to  be  a  free  and  independent  State, 
and  the  inhabitants  thereof  absolved  from  all  allegiance  to  the 
British   Crown,"  —  declared: 

'Conn.  Col.   Rec,  i.  580,  5X1. 

10  Petition,  in  Trumbull's   Hist,  of  Conn.,  i.  511,  512. 

1  Speech  of  Hon.  Jona.  W.   Edwards,  in  the  General  Assembly,  May, 
1 8. 

2  Swift's  System  of  the  Laws  of  Connecticut,  i.  56. 


14  ACTS    OF    I776    AND    1 784. 

"  That  the  form  of  Civil  Government  in  this  State  shall  con- 
tinue to  be  as  established  by  Charter  received  from  Charles  the 
Second,  King  of  England,  so  far  as  an  adherence  to  the  same 
will  be  consistent  with  an  absolute  Independence  of  this  State 
on  the  Crown  of  Great  Britain,  &c." 

In  the  revision  of  the  laws  in  1784,  a  similar  declaration  is  in- 
corporated with  the  "  Act  containing  an  Abstract  and  Declara- 
tion of  the  Rights  and  Privileges  of  the  People  of  this  State." 
The  preamble  of  this  act  affirms  that, 

"  The  people  of  this  State,  being,  by  the  Providence  of  God, 
free  and  independent,  have  the  sole  and  exclusive  right  of  gov- 
erning themselves  as  a  free,  sovereign,  and  independent  State; 
and  having  from  their  ancestors  derived  a  free  and  excellent  con- 
stitution of  government,  whereby  the  Legislature  depends  on 
the  free  and  annual  election  of  the  people,  they  have  the  best 
security  for  the  preservation  of  their  civil  and  religious  rights 
and  liberties." 

The  first  section  of  the  act  is  as  follows: 

"  Be  it  enacted  and  declared  by  the  Governor,  Council  and 
Representatives,  in  General  Court  assembled,  and  by  the  Au- 
thority of  the  same,  that  the  ancient  form  of  Civil  Government, 
contained  in  the  Charter  from  Charles  the  Second,  King  of  Eng- 
land, and  adopted  by  the  People  of  this  State,  shall  be  and  re- 
main the  Civil  Constitution  of  this  State,  under  the  sole  authority 
of  the  People  thereof,  independent  of  any  King  or  Prince  what- 
ever."3 

In  May,  1777,  an  act  was  passed  "  prescribing  the  form  of  an 
oath  to  be  taken  by  the  freemen  of  this  State,"  by  which  those 
receiving  it  were  bound  "  to  be  true  and  faithful  to  the  Governor 
and  Company  of  this  State,  and  the  Constitution  and  government 
thereof."  Every  freeman  was  required  to  take  this  oath  before 
being  allowed  to  vote  in  the  election  of  any  officer  of  the  govern- 
ment. The  same  form  —  with  the  substitution  of  "  said  State," 
for  "  the  Governor  and  Company  of  this  State  "  —  was  incorpo- 
rated in  the  revision  of  1784. 

If  the  government  of  the  colony,  before  the  revolution,  derived 
its  authority  from  the  consent  of  the  people,  and  not  from  the 
royal  charter  —  and  such  was  the  opinion  of  distinguished  jurists 
—  then,  "  the  constitution  which  originated  from  the  people,  and 
had  been  practised  upon,  continued  in  operation  after  the  declar- 
ation of  independence,  in  the  same  manner  as  before,  and  was 


Rev.  Acts  and   Laws,   1784,  p.   1. 


VALIDITY    OF    THESE    ACTS    QUESTIONED.  1 5 

equally  valid;"  the  act  of  1776,  to  establish  and  perpetuate  it, 
was  merely  declaratory,  and  there  was  no  necessity  of  calling  a 
convention  of  the  people,  either  to  ratify  the  action  of  the  gen- 
eral assembly,  or  to  agree  on  a  new  form  of  government.4 

But  on  this  point,  questions  soon  began  to  be  raised.  The 
author  of  a  pamphlet  printed  in  1782. 5  propounds  "  a  modest  and 
decent  inquiry,  whether,  in  this  state,  since  our  Charter  has  been 
vacated  by  King,  Lords,  and  Commons,  our  Independence  de- 
clared by  Congress  and  ratified  by  the  Legislature  of  this  State, 
we  have,  strictly  and  properly  speaking,  any  Civil  Constitution?" 
He  contends  that  the  charter  by  which  the  colony  was  invested 
with  all  the  powers  of  government  and  legislation,  having  been 
vacated,  "  whatever  powers  of  government  we  derived  from  our 
charter,  terminated  with  it,"  and  that  when  "  the  King  who 
grants,  and  a  corporation  possessed  of  a  charter,  both  agree  to 
declare  it  null  and  void,  it  is  vacated  to  all  intents  and  purposes 
whatever;  "  that  the  civil  constitution  of  Connecticut  having 
thus  terminated  with  the  charter,  "  it  most  certainly  was  the 
undoubted  right  of  the  People  to  say,  whether  they  would  be  gov- 
erned by  our  old  form  of  government,  or  whether  they  chose  to 
frame  a  new  one;  "  and,  "  if  that  is  right  and  prerogative  of  the 
people,  to  say  how  and  in  what  manner  they  choose  to  be  gov- 
erned," then  "  the  making  new  forms  of  civil  government,  or 
establishing  old  ones,  is  not  the  proper  business  of  our  repre- 
sentatives, without  that  power  being  specially  delegated  to  them 
by  the  people,"  and  "  it  now  lies  with  them  [the  people]  to  say 
whether  they  will  abide  in  the  same  situation  we  now  are  in,  or 
to  appoint  a  committee  of  delegates,  well  qualified  to  so  im- 

*  So  thought  Judge  Swift.  System  of  the  Laws  of  Connecticut,  i.  57,  58. 
Judge  Root  (C.  J.,  1796-1807),  in  the  introduction  to  the  first  volume  of 
his  Reports  of  Cases  Adjudged,  discusses  "  the  origin  of  governments  and 
laws  in  Connecticut,"  and  argues  that,  though  all  connection  with  the 
crown  of  England  was  broken  and  dissolved  by  the  revolution,  yet  "the 
Constitution  of  the  State  remained,  in  all  other  respects,  the  same  un- 
altered basis  of  government,  in  its  principles,  regulations,  and  efficient 
powers,  which  it  had  ever  been  from  its  first  foundation  and  establish- 
ment." 

Brief,  Decent,  but  Free  Remarks  and  Observations  on  Several 
Laws  passed  by  the  Honorable  Legislature  of  the  State  of  Connecticut. 
since  the  year  1775.  By  a  Friend  to  his  Country.  Hartford.  1782." 
(8vo,  p.  55.)  The  authorship  may  be  confidently  assigned  to  Dr.  Ben- 
jamin Gale,  of  Etillingworth —  who  adopted  nearly  the  same  course  of 
oning,  and  in  the  same  style,  in  his  letter  to  Erastus  Wolcott.  quoted 
on  the  following  page.     I  a  copy  of  this  pamphlet  with  Dr.  Gale's 

autograph  pri  sentation  to  Christopher  Leffingwell. 


l6  DR.    B.    GALE,    ON    THE   ACT    OF    1776; 

portant  an  undertaking  "  as  that  of  framing  a  constitution.  He 
states  that  the  action  of  the  general  assembly  in  1776  was 
'  looked  upon  by  the  more  thinking  and  judicious,  only  as  a 
temporary  thing,  until  our  troubles  should  be  over,  and  our  in- 
dependence acknowledged;  and  I  know  some  freemen,"  he  adds, 
"  who  were  conscientious  in  those  matters,  neglected  to  take  the 
freeman's  oath,  upon  these  very  principles,  who  cheerfully  took 
the  oath  of  allegiance  and  fidelity  to  the  States  —  supposing  the 
assembly's  adopting  our  charter  constitution  de  novo,  unin- 
structed,  to  be  unprecedented,  and  that  it  contained  some  things 
which  in  our  state  of  independence  are  not  salutary."6 

At  the  October  session,  1786,  a  bill  was  offered  in  the  House 
of  Representatives,  for  referring  to  the  freemen  a  proposition  to 
reduce  the  number  of  representatives.  Mr.  James  Davenport 
(of  Stamford)  moved  to  substitute  for  this  a  bill  to  reduce  the 
number  of  representatives,  without  the  reference  to  a  vote  of  the 
freemen.  Several  members  objected,  that  this  was  a  "  constitu- 
tional question;  the  assembly  having  no  right  to  alter  the  repre- 
sentation without  authority  given  by  their  constituents."  Mr. 
Davenport  replied: 

'  We  have  no  Constitution  but  the  laws  of  the  State.  The  Char- 
ter is  not  the  Constitution.  By  the  Revolution,  that  was  abro- 
gated. A  law  of  the  State  gave  a  subsequent  sanction  to  that 
which  before  was  of  no  force;  if  that  law  be  valid,  any  altera- 
tions made  by  a  later  act  will  also  be  valid;  if  not,  we  have  no 
Constitution  so  defined  as  to  preclude  the  Legislature  from  ex- 
ercising any  powers  necessary  for  the  good  of  the  people."7  The 
objection  to  the  introduction  of  the  bill  was  sustained  by  the 
House,  by  a  small  majority. 

A  few  months  later  (February,  1787),  Dr.  Benjamin  Gale,  in  a 
letter  to  Gen.  Erastus  Wolcott  (who  was  then  a  representative 
in  Congress),  wrote,  confidentially,  as  follows:8 

8  Pp.  24-27.  The  writer  points  out  three  particulars  in  which  alterations 
of  or  additions  to  the  established  form  of  government  might  prove  of 
advantage  to  the  State;  (1)  a  constitutional  provision  "that  no  citizen 
shall  hold  at  one  and  the  same  time,  more  than  one  place  of  public  trust, 
either  civil  or  military;  "  (2)  a  reduction  of  the  number  of  representatives 
to  one  from  each  town,  and  (3)  an  increase  of  the  number  of  councillors 
(or  upper  house)  to  three  from  each  county,  to  be  chosen  by  the  several 
counties,  and  not  on  a  general  ticket,     pp.  34,  35. 

7  New  Haven  Gazette  and  Conn.  Magazine,  Nov.  2,  1786,  p.  297. 

8  This  letter  is  with  the  Wolcott  MSS.  (vol.  iv.)  in  the  Library  of  the 
Conn.  Historical  Society. 


PROPOSES    A    CONVENTION    TO    FORM    A   CONSTITUTION.         \J 

"  Since  I  am  speaking  of  Constitutions,  suffer  me  to  tell  you, 
in  this  State  we  have  no  civil  constitution  at  all.  Our  charter,  while 
in  force,  was  a  grant  of  privileges  by  the  Crown  of  England  to 
the  inhabitants  of  this  colony.  After  the  Crown  vacated  our 
charter,  we  ratified  it  by  our  Declaration  of  Independence.  Our 
assembly  voted  it  should  be  deemed  the  Civil  Constitution  of  this 
State.  But,  sir,  you  know  that  a  civil  constitution  is  a  charter,  a 
bill  of  rights,  or  a  compact  made  between  the  rulers  and  the  ruled. 
Most  certain,  our  charter  can  in  no  sense  of  propriety  be  so  re- 
puted. Our  representatives  are  in  no  sense  chosen  to  frame  a 
civil  constitution  for  us,  nor  is  any  general  assembly  which  I  ever 
yet  saw,  collectively  considered,  proper  persons  to  frame  a  civil 
constitution.  They  are  too  numerous  a  body;  nor  do  they  suffi- 
ciently understand  government,  to  do  this  thing." 

In  the  pamphlet  of  1782  ("  Brief,  Decent,  but  Free  Remarks," 
&c.)  Dr.  Gale  had  suggested  the  same  objections  to  referring  to 
the  general  assembly  so  "  nice,  delicate,  and  important  an  affair," 
and  proposed  "  that  each  town  be  directed  to  make  the  nomina- 
tion of  one  man,  for  that  end;  and  that  the  honorable  assembly, 
out  of  that  nomination,  elect  two,  four,  or  six,  in  each  county,  to 
carry  the  same  into  execution,"  by  framing  a  new  constitution, 
which  shall  be  printed,  and  submitted  to  the  people  "  deliberately 
to  adopt  or  reject  it."     (p.  29.) 

The  author  of  "  An  Address  to  the  Legislature  and  People  of 
Connecticut,  on  the  subject  of  dividing  the  State  into  Districts  for 
the  Election  of  Representatives  in  Congress,"  printed  in  (Janu- 
ary) 1791,9  advocates  the  amendment  of  the  constitution  by  a  con- 
vention to  be  specially  entrusted  with  that  work.  Though  Con- 
necticut "  has  the  merit  of  giving,  at  a  remote  period,  a  degree 
of  perfection  to  some  parts  of  her  constitution,  which,  if  it  be 
not  final,  is  at  least  unrivalled,"  yet,  says  this  writer: 

"  I  am  sensible  that  the  constitution  is  susceptible  of  a  great 
number  of  fundamental  improvements;  and  I  look  forward,  with 
an  anxious  heart,  to  that  mature  and  happy  season,  when  the 
spirit  of  people  will  admit  of  a  great  and  radical  reform,  by  their 
own  delegates  commissioned  for  this  express  purpose.  I  am 
aware  that  the  policy  of  assembling  a  convention,  and  establish- 
ing a  form  of  government  superior  to  the  power  of  the  legisla- 
ture, has  been  called  in  question  by  some;  and  in  particular,  lias 
been   ingeniously  controverted   by   a   writer  of  our   own    State-. 

'"  Bj    1  <  itizen  ol  Connecticut."     Printed  in  New  Haven.  8vo,  p.  37. 

2 


l8  JUDGE    SWIFT,    ON    THE    CONSTITUTION. 

whose  merit  I  have  in  high  estimation.  But  whatever  influence 
his  reasonings  might  have  in  my  mind,  in  respect  to  the  strictness 
of  principle,  I  must  acknowledge  I  should  despair  of  ever  seeing 
a  complete  reform  in  the  political  establishments  of  this  State 
accomplished  in  the  ordinary  course  of  legislation.  The  ques- 
tion then  in  my  mind  is  whether  the  great  and  pressing  import- 
ance of  renovating  a  defective  and  unbalanced  government  will 
not  justify  a  departure  from  that  strict  political  principle  on  which 
the  legislature  would  claim  all  the  powers  of  the  community." 

Prior  to  1800,  the  number  of  those  who  denied  the  validity  of 
the  act  of  1776  and  maintained  the  necessity,  or  the  propriety, 
of  calling  a  convention  to  frame  a  new  constitution,  was  very 
small.  The  doctrine  laid  down  by  Judge  Swift  in  1795,  is  that 
which  was  generally  held  by  the  leaders  of  public  opinion,  was 
sustained  by  the  courts,  and  accepted  by  a  large  majority  of  the 
freemen: 

"  Some  visionary  theorists  have  pretended  that  we  have  no 
constitution,  because  it  has  not  been  reduced  to  writing,  and  rati- 
fied by  the  people.  It  is,  therefore,  necessary,  to  trace  the  con- 
stitution of  our  government  to  its  origin,  for  the  purpose  of  show- 
ing its  existence,  that  it  has  been  accepted  and  approved  by  the 
people,  and  is  well  known  and  precisely  bounded.  .  .  .  The 
colonial  governments  of  Connecticut  and  New  Haven  derived 
their  authority  from  the  voluntary  association  and  agreement  of 
the  people.  Here  the  social  compact  was  made  and  entered  into, 
in  the  most  explicit  manner.  .  .  .  The  application  of  the  people 
for  the  charter  [of  1662],  and  their  voluntary  acceptance  of  it, 
gave  efficacy  to  the  government  it  constituted,  and  not  the  royal 
signature.  .  .  .  During  the  whole  period  of  the  existence  of 
the  colonial  government,  Connecticut  was  considered  as  having 
only  paid  a  nominal  allegiance  to  the  British  Crown,  for  the  pur- 
pose of  receiving  protection  and  defence,  as  a  part  of  the  British 
empire ;  but  always  exercised  legislation  respecting  all  the  inter- 
nal concerns  of  the  community,  to  the  exclusion  of  all  authority 
and  control  from  the  King  and  parliament,  as  much  as  an  inde- 
pendent State." 

"  The  necessary  consequence  was  that  the  renunciation  of  al- 
legiance to  the  British  crown,  and  the  withdrawing  from  the 
British  empire,  did  not  in  any  degree  affect  or  alter  the  constitu- 
tion of  the  government.  The  constitution  which  originated  from 
the  people,  and  had  been  practised  upon,  continued  in  operation, 
after  the  declaration  of  independence,  in  the  same  manner  as  be- 
fore, and  was  equally  valid.  The  people  were  only  discharged 
from  a  nominal  allegiance  to  Great  Britain.  .  .  .  Their  inter- 
nal government  remained  unaltered  and  the  same.  .  .  .  The 
general  assembly  ratified  and  confirmed  the  declaration  of  inde- 


ACT    OF    I776    VALIDATED    BY    THE    PEOPLE'S    ASSENT.  19 

pendence,  they  passed  an  act  recognizing  the  ancient  form  of 
government,  they  made  such  alterations  and  introduced  such 
amendments,  as  the  change  of  circumstances  required.  If  the 
principles  before  stated  are  true,  then  the  conduct  of  the  legis- 
lature was  constitutional,  and  there  was  no  necessity  of  calling 
a  convention  of  the  people  to  agree  on  the  form  of  the  govern- 
ment."10 

Even  if  it  be  admitted  that  the  charter  was  the  sole  basis  of 
government,  and,  consequently,  that  separation  from  Great 
Britain  annulled  the  constitution  —  that  the  legislature  having 
no  power  to  act  under  the  former  constitution,  could  give  their 
acts  no  binding  authority  on  the  people  —  "  yet  the  subsequent 
conduct  of  the  people,"  says  Swift,  "  in  assenting  to,  approving  of, 
and  acquiescing  in  the  acts  of  the  legislature,  has  established 
and  rendered  them  valid  and  binding,  and  given  them  all  the 
force  and  authority  of  an  express  contract.  .  .  .  The  assent  of 
the  people  may  be  expressed  by  delegates  chosen  for  that  pur- 
pose to  meet  in  convention,  or  it  may  be  implied  by  a  tacit  ac- 
quiescence and  approbation." 

The  same  doctrine  was  maintained  by  Mr.  (afterwards  Chief 
Justice)  Daggett,  in  an  anonymous  pamphlet  published  in  1805.1 
"  Nothing  can  be  more  groundless  and  false,"  he  says,  than  the 
statement  that  the  existing  government  "  never  had  the  consent 
and  sanction  of  the  people": 

'  It  was  originally  framed  and  adopted  by  the  people.  .  .  . 
In  all  their  elections,  in  all  their  appointments  of  ofheers,  the 
people  have  practically  assented  to  this  government  as  the  gov- 
ernment of  their  own  choice;  and  this  practical  assent  continued 
for  ages,  and  repeated  hundreds  of  times  by  their  own  volun- 
tary acts,  is  the  strongest  possible  evidence  of  a  hearty  approba- 
tion; it  is  an  approbation,  too,  that  has  rested  on  the  surest 
foundation  —  that  of  a  long  and  thorough  experience.  .  .  .  More 
than  almost  any  other  government  upon  earth,  it  is  the  legitimate 
child  of  the  people,  who  have  hitherto  constantly  nursed  it  and 
cleaved  to  it  with  affectionate  attachment ;  and  whenever  the 
people  (far  off  be  the  day!)  shall  cease  to  give  it  their  voluntary 
assent  and  support,  it  must  instantly  fall." 

While  the  notion  that  no  constitution  could  be  valid  without 
formal  ratification  by  the  freemen  was  making  its  way  from  the 
brains  of  "  some  visionary  theorists  "  to  the  apprehension  of  a 
considerable  minority  of  the  people,  a  new  political  party  had 
grown    up   in    Connecticut   and    the   "  anti-fcederalists  "  —  who 


1  it 


Swift's  Sttgtem  of  the  Laws  of  (011m  cticut,  vol.  i.,  pp.  55-58. 
Steady   Habits  Vindicated,"  &c,  p.  II. 


20         ANTI-FEDERALISM.       THE    MIDDLETOWN    CONVENTION. 

afterwards  took  the  name  of  "  republicans,"  but  were  stigmatized 
by  their  opponents  as  "  democrats,"  —  became  strong  enough  in 
numbers  and  influence  seriously  to  embarrass  the  action  of  the 
federal  majority.  The  history  of  this  party  in  the  State  begins 
with  the  "  Middletown  Convention"  of  September  30th,  1783, — 
or  more  accurately,  with  the  manifestation  of  opposition  to  the 
"  commutation  act  "  by  which  Congress  granted  five  years'  full 
pay  to  the  officers  of  the  revolutionary  army,  in  lieu  of  half  pay 
for  life.  In  the  summer  of  1783,  town  meetings  were  held  in 
several  towns,  at  which  the  justice  of  this  payment  was  called  in 
question,  and  resolves  were  passed  denouncing  it  as  oppressive 
to  the  people,  and  subversive  of  the  principles  of  a  republican 
government.  A  convention  was  called  by  committees  of  Hart- 
ford, Wethersfield,  and  Glastenbury,  to  meet  at  Middletown  on 
the  third  of  September,  to  consider  this  subject  and  devise  a  mode 
of  redress.  At  the  adjourned  meeting  of  this  convention,  Sept. 
30th,  about  fifty  towns  —  a  majority  of  all  the  towns  in  the  State 

—  were  represented,  and  a  petition  or  remonstrance  against  the 
commutation  was  addressed  to  the  general  assembly.  At  a  sec- 
ond adjourned  session,  Dec.  16th,  opposition  to  the  order  of  the 
Cincinnati  was  manifested,  by  commending  a  pamphlet  which 
had  recently  been  published  against  that  society,  by  Judge  y£da- 
nus  Burke  of  South  Carolina.  At  the  last  meeting,  in  March, 
1784,  an  address  to  the  people  of  Connecticut  was  framed,  pre- 
senting objections  to  the  commutation  act  and  to  the  Cincinnati.1 

When  the  question  of  ratifying  the  federal  constitution  was 
submitted  to  a  convention  in  1788,  the  vote  in  the  affirmative 
was  one  hundred  and  twenty-eight;  in  the  negative,  or  anti- 
federal,  forty  —  about  one-fourth  of  the  whole.  This  nearly  rep- 
resents the  relative  strength  of  the  two  parties  in  Connecticut 
at  this  time  and  for  some  years  afterwards. 

Among  the  prominent  anti-federal  leaders  of  this  period,  were 
some  who  had  filled  high  offices  in  the  State,  distinguished  patri- 
ots of  the  revolution,  and  men  of  influence  in  the  general  assem- 
bly as  well  as  among  their  immediate  constituents.  William 
Williams  of  Lebanon  (a  signer  of  the  Declaration),  Gen.  James 
Wadsworth  of  Durham,  Gen.  Erastus  Wolcott  of  East  Windsor, 

—  all  members  of  the  Council,  or  upper  house,  —  Dr.  Benjamin 

1  See  Noah  Webster's  "  History  of  Polit.  Parties  in  the  U.  States,"  in 
"A  Collection  of  Papers,"   &c.   (1843),  pp.  317-320. 


FEDERALISTS   OPPOSE    THE    RE-ELECTION    OF   ADAMS.  21 

Gale  of  Killingworth,  Joseph  Hopkins,  Esq.,  of  Waterbury, 
Col.  Peter  Bulkley  of  Colchester,  Col.  William  Worthington  of 
Saybrook,  Capt.  Abraham  Granger  of  Suffield,  —  were  counted 
with  the  opposition,  and  denounced  by  the  zealous  supporters  of 
the  administration,  as  anti-federalists,  '  democrats,'  '  anarchists,' 
or  worse.2 

After  the  ratification  of  the  national  constitution,  there  was, 
for  a  few  years,  comparative  quiet  in  Connecticut  politics.  It 
was  not  until  the  last  year  of  John  Adams's  administration,  that 
the  "  steady  habits  "  of  the  State  were  again  disturbed  by  the 
violence  of  party.  Federalism  was  never  more  absolutely  dom- 
inant than  in  1798.  Two  years  afterwards  (Aug.  3,  1800)  Fisher 
Ames,  of  Massachusetts,  in  a  letter  to  Oliver  Wolcott  of  Con- 
necticut —  who  was  then  secretary  of  the  treasury,  —  forebod- 
ing defeat  in  the  approaching  presidential  election,  suggested  a 
truth  which  experience  authorizes  us  to  regard  almost  as  a  gen- 
eral law  of  political  revolutions  in  a  republic:  "  Perhaps  a  party 
whenever  it  thinks  itself  strong,  naturally  splits;  nothing  but 
dread  of  its  rival  will  bind  it  firmly  enough  together."3  The 
federalists  were  already  divided,  and  knowledge  of  this  fact, 
which  could  no  longer  be  concealed  from  the  people,  revived  the 
hopes  and  stimulated  the  energies  of  the  opposition. 

It  was  certain  that  Mr.  Adams  could  not  again  receive  the 
unanimous  vote  of  his  party,  for  the  presidency.  For  reasons, 
the  soundness  of  which  need  not  be  discussed  here,  he  had  lost 
the  confidence  of  influential  federalists  in  Connecticut.  "  It  is 
with  grief  and  humiliation,  but  at  the  same  time  with  perfect 
confidence  "  —  wrote  Oliver  Wolcott,  to  George  Cabot  of  Mas- 
sachusetts, in  June,  1800,  —  "  that  I  declare  that  no  administra- 
tion of  the  government  by  President  Adams  can  be  successful. 
...  It  is  clear  to  my  mind  that  we  shall  never  find  ourselves 
in  the  straight  road  of  federalism  while  Mr.  Adams  is  presi- 
dent."4    Uriah  Tracy  assured  Senator  Stockton  of  New  Jersey, 

2  To  what  height  party  spirit  had  risen  in  1786-7,  and  with  what  extrava- 
gant license  the  federal  wits  and  the  federal  press  generally,  assailed  their 
opponents,  may  be  seen  in  "  The  Anarchiad,"  a  scries  of  papers  in  verse, 
originally  published  in  the  A'<?cC  Haven  Gazette,  which  are  understood 
to  have  been  written  by  Col.  David  Humphreys,  John  Trumbull,  Joel 
Barlow,  and  Dr.  Lemuel  Hopkins,  —  possibly,  with  sonic  help  from  Dr. 
■lit. 
Gibb's   M'-inoirs  of  the  Administrations  of  Washington  and  Adams,  ii. 

396. 

'  Ibid.  ii.  371. 


22  THE    REPUBLICAN    MINORITY    GAINS    STRENGTH. 

"  that  the  State  of  Connecticut  would  do  any  thing  to  promote 
the  true  interest  of  the  government  at  this  crisis;  that  they  had 
no  predilection;  on  the  contrary,  the  men  of  most  importance 
were  disgusted  and  entirely  alienated  from  the  president."5 
Two  months  later,  Wolcott,  in  a  letter  to  Fisher  Ames,  not  only 
expressed  his  conviction  that  "  Mr.  Adams  ought  not  to  be  sup- 
ported," but  intimated  a  doubt  whether  "  his  re-election  would 
be  a  less  evil  to  the  country  than  to  incur  any  risque  of  the  pro- 
motion of  Mr.  Jefferson  ":  for,  "however  dangerous  the  elec- 
tion of  Mr.  Jefferson  may  prove  to  the  community,  I  do  not 
perceive  that  any  portion  of  the  mischief  would  be  avoided  by 
the  election  of  Mr.  Adams."6  "  Let  who  will  be  president  "  — 
so  thought  Chauncey  Goodrich,  — "  the  pride  of  American 
character  and  office  for  awhile  must  be  faded  ";  as  for  Connecti- 
cut, "  the  public  mind  is  puzzled  and  fretted.  People  don't 
know  what  to  think  of  measures  or  men;  they  are  mad  because 
they  are  in  the  dark."7 

When  leaders  speculate  on  the  advantages  of  defeat,  and  the 
rank  and  file  are  "  puzzled  and  fretted,"  opposition  is  likely  to 
gain  a  good  many  new  recruits.  The  republicans  understood 
how  to  take  advantage  of  the  situation.  The  federalists  began 
to  admit  that,  even  in  Connecticut,  "  the  skillful  attacks  of  a  vin- 
dictive and  intelligent  opposition,"  were  becoming  formidable,  — 
were  "  destroying  all  confidence  "  in  the  administration,  even 
while  "  the  papers  on  our  side  are  filled  with  toasts  and  nonsen- 
sical paragraphs  attributing  wisdom  and  firmness  to  the  Presi- 
dent."8 Gen.  Ebenezer  Huntington  wrote  from  Norwich,  in 
August:  "  There  is  a  change  of  opinion  affecting  the  people  of 
this  State;  and  at  present,  I  am  doubtful  what  extent  it  will 
gain.  There  are  many  who  have  heretofore  assumed  the  charac- 
ter of  federalists,  who  have  lately  shown  themselves  democrats, 
and  are  high  in  their  commendation  of  Jefferson,  in  hopes  to 
partake  of  the  loaves  and  fishes  which  are  to  be  distributed  by 
the  new  President."9  (The  federalists  spoke  of  their  opponents, 
indifferently,  as  "Jacobins,"  or  "democrats,"  —  never  conced- 
ing to  them  an  exclusive  right  to  the  designation  of  "  repub- 
licans.")10 

6  Ibid.  ii.  374.  6  Ibid.  401.  7  Ibid.  394. 

8  Ibid.  371  (Wolcott  to  G.  Cabot).  "Ibid.  398. 

10  Abraham   Bishop,   in   an   Oration   on   "Connecticut   Republicanism" 


a 


STEADY    HABITS  "    RE-ESTABLISHED.  23 


National  defeat,  in  the  election  of  Mr.  Jefferson,  restored 
union  to  the  federal  party  in  Connecticut.  Its  relative  strength 
was  somewhat  impaired  by  desertion,  and  —  to  say  nothing  of 
changes  wrought  by  honest  convictions  — "  the  loaves  and 
fishes,"  might  now  and  then  tempt  a  straggler  to  the  republican 
camp.  But  the  State,  as  well  as  the  national  government,  had 
its  rewards  for  the  faithful,  and  the  federal  managers  took  care 
that  these  were  judiciously  distributed.  The  party  was  no 
longer  without  that  wholesome  "  dread  of  its  rival,"  so  essential 
to  the  preservation  of  union:  but  it  was  strong  enough  to  main- 
tain, for  sixteen  years  yet,  against  a  vigorous  opposition,  and 
all  the  republican  influences  which  could  be  brought  to  bear 
from  without,  absolute  control  of  the  State  government  and  of 
legislation.  It  was  the  boast  of  the  federalists,  and  the  sneer  of 
their  adversaries,  that  the  "  steady  habits  "  of  Connecticut  were 
too  firmly  established  to  be  affected  by  changes  in  the  national 
administration  or  in  neighboring  States.  The  Republican 
Watch-Tower  (Cheetharfi's  paper)  of  New  York,  in  an  article 
on  "  Connecticut  Policy,"  June  17th,   1801,  declares  that 

"  The  sentiments  of  the  State  have  been  marked,  as  well  while 
a  colony  as  now,  with  a  steadiness  that  excludes  both  retro- 
gradation  and  advancement.  Like  an  isthmus,  inanimate  and 
immovable,  she  bids  defiance  to  the  meliorating  progression 
made  on  both  sides  of  her.  The  advancement  of  political  sci- 
ence, generated  by  our  revolution,  has  neither  changed  her  con- 
stitution nor  affected  her  steady  habits.  .  .  .  A  fanatic  venera- 
tion for  a  pampered,  deluding  and  anti-christian  priesthood, 
renders  [her  people]  the  dupes  of  their  cunning,  and  sub- 
servient to  their  power.  .  .  .  And  the  citizens,  really  honest, 
but  enveloped  in  superstition,  arc  converted  into  instruments  by 
the  cunning  of  their  priestly  rulers,  to  debase  themselves  and  to 
exalt  their  oppressors."11 

•'  The   steady   habits   of    New    England,"    said    Mr.    Abraham 

(  New  Haven,  Sept.,  1800.)  seems  to  accept  for  his  party  the  name  of 
Ifcmocrals.  "  The  terms  '  repuhlicans  '  and  '  democrats  '  are,"  he  says, 
"used  synonymously  throughout  the  oration,  because  the  men  who 
maintain  the  principles  of  1776,  are  characterized  by  one  or  the  other 
of  these  names  in  different  parts  of  the  country  "  (p.  7). 

"  "  Kvery   person    who   has   read   the   principal    Jacobin    gazettes   for   a 

considerable    time    past,"    says    Mr.    Dwight,    in    his    Cincinnati    oration, 

with  reference  to  this  extract   from   the  Watch  Tower,  "must  have  seen 

that  there  is  existing  a  peculiar  animosity  against  the  government,  in- 

•ltions,  clergy,  and  people  of  Connecticut."     The  federalists  recipro- 

•  <1   all   the  animosity,   and    were  noways   humbled   by   the   rebukes   they 


24      THE    "  STEADY    HABITS        OF    CONNECTICUT    FEDERALISM. 

Bishop,  in  his  oration  at  Wallingford,  March  nth,  1801,  "pre- 
sent the  fourth  obstacle  to  the  diffusion  of  truth.  The  sailor 
nailed  the  needle  of  his  compass  to  the  cardinal  point,  and  swore 
it  should  not  be  always  traversing.  So  does  the  New  England 
friend  of  order." 

"  It  has  become  very  fashionable,"  replied  a  federal  orator,  "  to 
ridicule  the  attachment  of  the  people  of  Connecticut  to  their 
government,  their  institutions,  and  their  "  steady  habits."  But  be- 
fore we  add  our  sneers  to  those  of  the  Jacobins',  let  us  devote  a 
few  moments  to  a  consideration  of  the  nature  and  effects  of  that 
government,  those  institutions,  and  habits."  In  the  course  of 
this  review,  he  remarks: 

"  Connecticut  exhibits  the  only  instance  in  the  history  of  na- 
tions, of  a  government  purely  Republican,  which  has  stood  the 
test  of  experience  for  more  than  a  century  and  a  half,  with  firm- 
ness enough  to  withstand  the  shocks  of  faction,  and  revolution. 
Our  government  is  a  government  of  practice,  and  not  of  theory. 

constantly  received  from  the  "  Jacobin  "  press  of  other  states.  They 
boasted  of  the  position  of  their  State,  "  placed  as  a  bulwark  against  the 
approaches  of  a  disorganizing  spirit."  "  However  enslaved  they  may  be, 
either  by  superstition  or  priestcraft,  the  people  of  Connecticut  have  got 
sense  enough  left,  to  appreciate  the  merits  of  those  who  thus  traduce 
their  character,  country,  government,  and  religion,  whether  they  spring 
from  her  own  soil,  or  are  the  renegadoes  of  Europe."  "  If  we  are  to 
learn  the  principles  of  liberty  and  government  from  the  Coopers,  Cal- 
enders, Duanes,  and  Cheethams,  of  England,  Scotland,  and  Ireland,  we 
have  got  to  pass  through  a  tremendous  and  bloody  schooling." 
(Dwight's  oration,  15,  32,  41.)  The  following  lines  from  "  Sketches  of 
the  Times,  for  the  year  1803  "  —  a  New  Year's  address  for  the  Hartford 
C  our  ant,  1804,  (re-printed  with  "  The  Echo,"  in  1807),  were  probably 
from  Theodore  Dwight's  pen: 

"  And  here,  in  erring  reason's  spite, 

'Mid  storms  of  truth,  and  floods  of  light, 

Unmov'd  by  threats,  unawed  by  fears, 

Connecticut  her  front  uprears. 

On  Democratic  frontiers  plac'd, 

By  spirits  base  and  foul  disgrae'd, 

Annoy'd  with  Jacobinic  engines, 

And  doom'd  .to  Govermental  vengeance, 

Straight  on  her  course  she  firmly  steers, 

Nor  jibes,  nor  tacks,  nor  scuds,  nor  veers. 

Not  the  whole  force  they  all  can  yield, 

Can  drive  her  vet'rans  from  the  field. 

The  same  pure,   patriotic  fires 

Which  warm'd  the  bosoms  of  their  Sires, 

That  generous,  that  effulgent  flame, 

Which  glow'd  in  Winthrop's  deathless  name, 

Unsullied  through  their  bosoms  runs, 

Inspires   and   animates   her   sons." 


THE    STATE   HAS    NO    WRITTEN    CONSTITUTION.  2$ 

.  .  .  Resting  its  claim  to  pre-eminence  on  the  ground  of  long 
experience  and  practice,  it  sets  all  theory  at  defiance.  At  the 
same  time,  it  is  not  easy  to  say  what  constitutes  its  strength  and 
force.  .  .  .  We  have,  in  fact,  no  written  constitution,  no  ex- 
ecutive power  or  patronage."1 

In  a  note  to  this  oration,  Mr.  Dwight  gave  a  sketch  of  the  con- 
stitutional history  of  the  State,  and  of  the  provisions  of  the  char- 
ter of  1662,  which  was  "  little  more  than  a  re-establishment  of 
the  first  constitution,  with  somewhat  more  explicitness." 

"  This  charter,  of  course,  stands  at  the  head  of  our  laws,  as  the 
only  constitution  which  the  State  possesses.  ...  It  impowers 
the  inhabitants  of  the  corporation  to  plead,  and  to  be  impleaded, 
in  legal  suits,  to  have  a  seal,  to  choose  yearly  a  governor, 
deputy-governor,  and  twelve  assistants,  to  hold  two  general  as- 
semblies in  a  year,  to  appoint  and  admit  freemen,  to  elect  offi- 
cers, to  erect  judicatories,  to  ordain  laws,  to  impose  fines,  and 
to  erect  wharves  for  the  purpose  of  drying  fish.  With  no  other 
powers  than  these,  it  would  seem  impossible  that  a  Colony,  or 
State,  could  possibly  exist  in  peace  and  safety  for  so  long  a  time 
as  since  the  year  1639.  Such,  however,  is  the  fact,  and  it  is 
owing  to  the  rectitude  of  the  administration  of  the  government, 
and  the  effects  of  the  institutions  established  under  it.  All  the 
defects  in  the  constitution  have  been  supplied  by  practice;  and 
the  practical  range  is  as  well  understood  as  though  every  prin- 
ciple had  originally  been  reduced  to  writing.' 


"2 


"  Steady  habits  "  and  federalism  came  to  be  regarded  as  syn- 
onymous terms;  and  a  distinguished  federal  writer,  in  1805,  in 
"  a  serious  remonstrance  to  the  people  of  Connecticut,  against 
changing  their  government,"  reminds  them,  that  "  a  new  struc- 
ture or  form  of  government  would  gradually  produce  a  corre- 
spondent change  in  manners,  and  your  steady  sober  habits  —  the 
theme  of  ridicule,  but  the  real  glory  of  Connecticut  —  would  be 
lost."3  The  minority  complained  that  "  every  man  who  cher- 
ished republican  principles,  was  derided  and  abused  as  a  deserter 
from  steady  habits."4 

1  Theodore  Dwight's  Oration  at  New  Haven,  before  the  Society  of  the 
Cincinnati,  July  7,    [8oi,     pp.   7,  8. 

2  Ibid.  p.  35- 

1  Steady  Habits  Vindicated,  or  a  Serious  Remonstrance,  &c.  By  a 
Friend  to  the  Public  Welfare  [David  Gaggett,  Esq.]  Hartford,  1805. 
p.  14. 

4  Abraham   Bishop's  Oration,    [804.   (p.   15.) 


26  THE    REPUBLICANS    DEMAND    A    CONSTITUTION". 

Though  leading  republicans  had,  from  time  to  time,  urged  the 
necessity  and  importance  of  forming"  a  new  constitution,  to  be 
submitted  to  the  people  for  ratification,  it  was  not  until  the  year 
1804,  that  this  measure  was  incorporated  in  the  republican  plat- 
form. It  was  brought  prominently  into  notice  by  Abraham 
Bishop,  of  New  Haven,  in  an  oration  delivered  in  Hartford,  May 
1  ith,  1804,  at  a  republican  celebration,  "  in  honor  of  the  election 
of  President  Jefferson,  and  the  peaceable  acquisition  of  Louisi- 
ana."5 

"  At  the  Declaration  of  Independence,"  said  Mr.  Bishop,  "  the 
charter  of  Charles  II.  became  of  no  effect  and  it  was  proper  that 
the  people  of  this  free  State  should,  like  the  people  of  other  free 
States,  have  been  convened  to  form  a  constitution.  But  the 
Legislature,  which  was  not  empowered  for  that  purpose,  and 
which  may  repeal  at  pleasure  its  own  laws,  usurped  the  power 
of  enacting,  that  the  form  of  government  contained  in  the  char- 
ter of  King  Charles  should  be  the  civil  constitution  of  this  State. 
Thus,  by  the  pleasure  of  his  Majesty,  all  the  legislative,  execu- 
tive, and  judicial  powers  of  government  tumbled  into  a  common 
mass,  together  with  the  power  of  raising  armies,  whenever  the 
stockholders  of  power  should  think  best. 

'  This  precise  condition  of  society,  absurd  and  unsafe  as  it  is 
in  theory,  has  proved  far  more  so  in  practice.  At  the  present 
moment  all  these  powers,  together  with  a  complete  con- 
trol of  elections,  is  in  the  hands  of  seven  lawyers,6  who  have 
gained  a  seat  at  the  council  board.  These  seven  men  virtually 
make  and  repeal  laws  as  they  please,  appoint  all  the  judges,  plead 
before  those  judges,  and  constitute  themselves  a  supreme  court 
of  errors  to  decide  in  the  last  resort  on  the  laws  of  their  own 
making.  To  crown  this  absurdity,  they  have  repealed  a  law 
which  prohibited  them  to  plead  before  the  very  court  of  which 
they  are  judges."     (pp.  9,  10.) 

After  pointing  out  various  evils  which,  from  the  republican 
point  of  view,  were  necessary  results  of  "  such  complicated  usur- 
pation of  power,"  he  proposes  (p.  16)  as  the  remedy  — 

'  That  the  people  shall  be  convened  to  form  a  constitution 

"  Printed  for  the  General  Committee  of  Republicans."  From  Sidney's 
Press,  1804,  8vo,  pp.  24. 

6  In  a  note,  Mr.  Bishop  named  "  Messrs.  Daggett,  [Nathaniel]  Smith, 
Chauncey  Goodrich,  [Jonathan]  Brace,  [John]  Allen,  [William]  Ed- 
mond,  and  [Elizur]  Goodrich,  —  holding  the  same  undefined  powers 
which  their  predecessors  have  held,  and  which  their  successors  shall  hold, 
till  we  shall  have  a  constitution." 


REPUBLICAN    DELEGATES    MEET    AT   NEW    HAVEN.  2.J 

WHICH     SHALL     SEPARATE     THE     LEGISLATIVE,     EXECUTIVE,     AND 

JUDICIAL     POWERS, SHALL     DEFINE     THE     QUALIFICATION'S     OF 

FREEMEN,  SO  THAT  LEGISLATORS  SHALL  NOT  TAMPER  WITH 
ELECTION  LAWS,  AND  SHALL  DISTRICT  THE  STATE,  SO  THAT  FREE- 
MEN  MAY  JUDGE  OF  THE  CANDIDATES   FOR  THEIR  SUFFRAGES." 

Mr.  Bishop's  oration  was  "  printed  by  the  republican  general 
committee,"  and  distributed  throughout  the  State.  A  writer  in 
the  American  Mercury  (republican)  of  August  2d,  1804,  "  on  the 
subject  of  a  Constitution,"  says,  that  until  the  publication  of  this 
oration,  "  it  was  not  generally  known  that  the  State  of  Connect- 
icut had  not  a  constitution,"  and  recommends  that  the  freemen 
in  each  town  should  hold  meetings  for  the  appointment  of  com- 
mittees to  confer  on  a  plan  for  the  election  of  delegates  to  a  con- 
vention. The  (federal)  Courant,  of  August  15th,  notices  this 
recommendation,  remarking  that  "Abraham  opened  on  this  sub- 
ject on  the  nth  of  May,  and  the  writers  in  the  Mercury  seem  de- 
termined to  make  the  most  of  it." 

That  discussion  of  this  subject  should  immediately  assume  a 
partisan  character  was  unavoidable,  for  Mr.  Bishop's  political 
associates  believed,  with  him,  that  "  a  constitution  would  give  a 
death-blow  to  Connecticut  federalism,  and,  with  it,  to  all  hos- 
tility against  the  general  government,"7  and  some,  if  not  all,  of 
the  federal  leaders  shared  this  conviction. 

On  the  30th  of  July,  the  Republican  General  Committee  (of 
which  Pierpont  Edwards  was  chairman)  addressed  a  circular  to 
their  party,  stating  that  "  many  very  respectable  republicans  are 
of  the  opinion  that  it  is  high  time  to  speak  to  the  citizens  of  Con- 
necticut, plainly  and  explicitly,  on  the  subject  of  forming  a  con- 
stitution ;  but  this  ought  not  to  be  done  without  the  approbation 
of  the  party;"  and  a  general  meeting  was  proposed,  to  be  held 
at  Xew  Haven  on  the  fifth  Wednesday  (29th)  of  August. 

(  )n  the  day  appointed,  republican  delegates  from  ninety-seven 
towns  assembled  at  the  state-house,  in  New  Haven.  Major 
William  Judd,  of  Farmington,  was  chosen  chairman,  and  Henry 
W.  Edwards  and  Lemuel  Whitman,  clerks.  The  meeting  was 
held  with  closed  doors.  It  was  declared,  as  "  the  unanimous 
opinion  of  this  meeting,  that  the  people  of  this  State  are  at  pres- 
ent without  a  Constitution  of  civil  government,"  and  it  was 
thereupon  resolved,  "  thai  it  is  expedient  to  take  measure's  pre- 

1  V  Bishop'    I  h  ation,  page  16. 


28  FEDERALISTS    OPPOSE    A    CONVENTION. 

paratory  to  the  formation  of  a  Constitution,  and  that  a  commit- 
tee be  appointed  to  draft  an  Address  to  the  People  of  this  State, 
on  that  subject."  The  committee  reported  an  address,  which 
was  accepted,  and  ten  thousand  copies  were  ordered  to  be 
printed  and  distributed.8 

The  issue  thus  formally  presented  was  made  a  prominent  one 
in  the  fall  election.  The  federalists  denounced  the  project  of  a 
convention  as  revolutionary,  subversive  of  law  and  order,  and  of 
the  "  steadv  habits  "  which  had  been  the  boast  of  the  State.  The 
republicans  were  by  no  means  unanimous  in  support  of  the 
measure,  notwithstanding  the  urgent  appeals  of  the  party  press 
and  the  untiring  exertions  of  the  party  managers.  In  Septem- 
ber, just  before  the  election,  a  federal  reply  to  the  New  Haven 
address  was  printed,  under  the  title  of  "  Count  the  Cost.  [An 
Address  to  the  Freemen  of  Connecticut  on  sundry  political  sub- 
jects, and  particularly  on  the  proposition  for  a  New  Constitu- 
tion. By  Jonathan  Steadfast."]  The  writer  (David  Daggett) 
reviewed  the  proceedings  of  the  New  Haven  meeting,  impugned 
the  motives  of  the  leaders  of  the  movement,  and  presented,  with 
remarkable  ability,  the  arguments  against  the  proposed  change 
in  the  form  of  civil  government.  "  This  project,"  he  said,  "  orig- 
inates entirely  in  a  spirit  of  Jacobinism:  it  is  a  new  theme  on 
which  to  descant  to  effect  a  revolution  in  Connecticut.  The  ob- 
ject is,  by  false  assertions,  to  induce  a  belief  that  no  constitution 
exists,  and  that  tyranny  prevails."  Commenting  on  the  course 
of  the  republican  party  for  a  few  years  previous,  he  comes  down 
to  "  Mr.  Bishop's  oration  on  the  nth  of  May,  declaring  among 
other  outrageous  and  wicked  falsehoods  that  Connecticut  had 
no  constitution,"  to  which  he  opposes  Mr.  Bishop's  declaration 
in  1789,  that  "  the  Constitution  of  Connecticut  is  the  best  in  the 
world,  —  it  has  grown  up  with  the  people,  and  it  is  fitted  to  their 
condition."  The  writer  proceeds  to  show  that  "  we  have  a  con- 
stitution —  a  free  and  happy  constitution.     It  was  to  our  fathers 

8  It  was  printed  on  a  small  half-sheet,  in  double  columns,  apparently 
from  "  Sidney's  Press,"  New  Haven.  Soon  afterwards  appeared  a  bur- 
lesque, printed  in  the  same  style  (and  at  the  same  press,)  professing  to 
be  the  address  and  draft  of  a  constitution  "  presented  to  the  Sovereign 
People  "  by  "  a  Convention  of  Republicans,  styling  themselves  '  The  Up- 
per-House of  Delegates  from  ninety-seven  towns,'  "  &c.  At  its  head 
stand,  in  large  capitals,  '  Liberty  !  '  '  Equality  !  '  The  proposed  Con- 
stitution vests  the  Executive  Power  '  in  Three  Consuls  to  be  chosen  for 
life  by  the  President  of  the  United  States,  provided  he  be  a  Republican;  if 
not,  by  the  Sovereign  People." 


PROCEEDINGS    AGAINST    THE    FIVE   JUSTICES.  20, 

like  the  shadow  of  a  great  rock  in  a  weary  land;  it  has  enabled 
them  to  transmit  to  us  a  fair  and  glorious  inheritance;  if  we 
suffer  revolutionists  to  rob  us  of  this  birthright  '  then  are  we 
bastards  and  not  sons.'  "  (pp.  10-13).  The  address  closes  with 
an  eloquent  and  skilfully  framed  appeal  to  every  freeman  to 
"  count  the  cost  "  before  acting  with  the  republicans  for  the  pro- 
posed reform. 

The  result  of  the  October  election,  in  an  increased  federal 
majority,  showed  that  the  popular  mind  was  not  yet  prepared 
for  a  radical  change. 

When  the  General  Assembly  met,  the  leaders  of  the  dominant 
party,  elated  by  success,  resolved  to  administer  a  signal  rebuke 
to  the  revolutionary  designs  of  the  minority.  Five  justices  of 
the  peace,9  who  had  attended  the  republican  meeting  at  Xew 
Haven  and  taken  part  in  its  proceedings,  were  cited  to  appear 
before  the  Assembly,  "  to  shew  reasons  why  their  commissions 
should  not  be  revoked,"  since  "  it  is  improper,"  as  the  preamble 
of  the  resolution  sets  forth,  "  to  entrust  the  administration  of  the 
laws  to  persons  who  hold  and  teach  that  the  government  is  an 
usurpation."  Asher  Miller  and  David  Daggett  were  appointed 
managers  on  the  part  of  the  State,  for  the  prosecution,  and  Pier- 
pont  Edwards,  by  permission  of  the  Assembly,  appeared  as 
counsel  for  the  respondents.  The  case  was  heard  by  the  two 
Houses  in  joint  convention,  October  30th.  Mr.  Edwards  ar- 
gued in  defence  of  the  Justices.  Mr.  Daggett  replied  in  behalf 
of  the  State.  He  reviewed  the  proceedings  and  the  published 
address  of  the  New  Haven  meeting,  and,  succinctly  tracing  the 
governmental  history  of  the  two  colonies  and  the  State,  from 
the  adoption  of  the  compact  of  1639,  and  the  foundation  of  civil 
polity  in  New  Haven,  he  aimed  to  "  demonstrate,  that  the  peo- 
ple of  Connecticut,  not  only  are  not  without  a  constitution,  but 
are  possessed  of  one  made  by  the  people,  in  a  sense  not  applicable 
to  any  other  people,"  and  that  theirs  was,  in  fact,  "  the  only 
government  ever  formed  upon  entirely  popular  principles."  The 
original  compact,  he  argued,  "  contains  the  vital  principles  of 
our  present  government." 

' 'I  In-  people,  in    [639,  vested  the  general  court,  or  assembly, 
with  the  power  of  making  and  repealing  all  laws,  and  of  dealing 

1  Major  William  Judd  of  Farmington  (who  was  Chairman  of  the  New 
Haven  meeting),  Jabez  II.  Tomlinson  of  Stratford,  Augur  Judson  of 
Huntington,  Hezekiah  Goodrich  of  Chatham,  and  Nathaniel  Manning 
ol  Windham. 


30  THE    ASSEMBLY    REVOKES    THEIR    COMMISSIONS. 

in  all  other  matters,  except  the  choice  of  magistrates.  And  might 
not  the  people  grant  this  power?  This  is  now  our  Constitu- 
tion —  our  fundamental  regulation  by  which  power  is  exercised. 
Who  then  shall  complain?  Surely  not  those  who  reiterate  with 
every  breath,  that  the  people  are  the  source  of  all  power.  If  the 
people  of  Connecticut  made  this  Constitution,  I  intreat  those  who 
advocate  the  right  of  the  people  to  make  Constitutions,  to  permit 
the  people  still  to  enjoy  it."     (p.  15.) 

He  showed  the  relation  of  the  compact  of  1639  to  the  charter 
of  1662,  and  the  acceptance  of  the  charter  by  the  people,  not 
only  by  their  action  on  its  first  receipt,  but  by  the  re-establish- 
ment of  its  authority  after  the  revolution  of  1689.  The  general 
assembly  not  only  declared,  in  1776,  that  "  the  form  of  govern- 
ment should  continue  to  be  as  established  by  charter,"  but  pre- 
scribed (by  act  of  May,  1777)  the  form  of  oath  to  be  taken  by 
freemen,  by  which  they  were  bound  "  to  be  true  and  faithful  to 
the  Governor  and  Company  of  this  State,  and  the  Constitution 
and  government  thereof."  This  oath,  substantially,  had  been 
taken  by  all  admitted  freemen,  and,  since  May,  1777,  "  more 
citizens  have  thus  sworn  to  support  our  Constitution  than  there 
are  now  taxable  males  in  the  State."10 

The  New  Haven  address  was  not  —  he  argued  —  "a  decent 
expression  of  opinion,"  merely;  it  was  "an  outrage  upon  de- 
cency" ;  and  it  was  the  duty  of  the  Legislature  "  to  withdraw 
from  men  who  denounce  the  government,  the  power  of  exer- 
cising its  authority." 

On  the  day  after  the  hearing,  the  governor  and  council  unani- 
mously passed  a  bill  revoking  the  commissions  of  the  offending 
justices,  and  in  this  bill  the  house  of  representatives  concurred 
by  a  majority  of  67,  —  yeas,  123,  nays,  56. 

Major  Judd,  who  was  a  lawyer  by  profession,  prepared  an 
argument  in  defence  of  himself  and  his  associates,  but  soon  after 
his  arrival  in  New  Haven  —  where  the  general  assembly  was  in 

10  Air.  Dagget's  Argument,  before  the  General  Assembly,  in  the 
Case  of  certain  Justices  of  the  Peace.  To  which  is  prefixed  a  brief 
History  of  .the  Proceedings  of  the  Assembly  [and  a  copy  of  the  New  Ha- 
ven Address].  New  Haven,  1804.  8vo.  pp.  30.  The  cause  of  the  prose- 
cution could  not  have  been  intrusted  to  better  hands.  Mr.  Dagget's 
argument  was  very  ingeniously  framed,  and  presented  with  great  ability. 
But  his  view  of  the  case  was  naturally  partisan  rather  than  judicial. 
After  he  became  Chief  Justice,  he  did  not  speak  of  the  government  under 
the  charter  with  the  same  unqualified  eulogy.  The  old  constitution,  he 
then  admitted,  "  gave  very  extensive  powers  to  the  legislature,  and  left 
too  much  (for  it  left  everything  almost,)  to  their  will."  (Starr  v.  Pease, 
8  Conn.  Rep.,  548). 


MAJOR    JUDD'S    ADDRESS.       A    QUESTION    OF    ORDER.  3 1 

session  —  he  was  taken  ill,  and  was  unable  to  appear  on  the  day- 
assigned  for  the  hearing  before  the  two  houses.  With  the  help 
of  his  friends,  his  "  brief,  or  summary  of  defence  "  was  hurried 
through  the  press,  but  he  died  before  the  last  sheet  was  printed, 
Nov.  13th,  1804.  The  next  day,  his  "  Address  to  the  People  of 
the  State  of  Connecticut,  on  the  subject  of  the  removal  of  him- 
self and  four  other  Justices  from  office,"  was  published  "  for  the 
general  committee  of  Republicans."1 

While  the  bill  for  revoking  the  commissions  was  under  discus- 
sion in  the  house  of  representatives,  Mr.  Samuel  Hart  (a  mem- 
ber for  Berlin)  ventured  the  suggestion  that  "  arguments  against 
it  would  be  unavailing,  when  there  was  the  disposition  and  the 
ability  to  pass  it."  This  was  construed  by  the  federal  majority  as 
an  imputation  on  the  justice  and  impartiality  of  the  House,  and 
the  offender  was  ordered  to  be  reprimanded  by  the  Speaker. 
When  called  upon  to  rise  in  his  place  to  receive  the  prescribed 
censure,  Mr.  Hart  submitted  a  novel  question  of  order,  by  asking 
"  if  there  was  any  rule  of  the  House  which  obliged  a  member  to 
rise,  for  a  reprimand?"  After  some  discussion,  the  Speaker 
(Hon.  Timothy  Pitkin)  gave  a  decision  in  the  affirmative.  An 
appeal  was  taken,  and  the  House  sustained  the  opinion  of  the 
chair.  Thereupon,  Mr.  Hart  rose,  and  the  reprimand  was  given 
and  received  in  due  form.  The  "  dilatory  motion  "  and  the  tem- 
porary embarrassment  of  the  majority  and  of  the  Speaker 
blunted  the  edge  of  the  censure  and  occasioned  great  glee  to 
the  republicans. 

In  the  spring  election  of  1805,  the  question  of  a  new  constitu- 
tion was  again  the  main  issue,  and  again  the  friends  of  "  steady 
habits  "  were  successful.2  The  measure  continued  to  hold  a 
prominent  place  in  the  republican  platform,  but,  for  several  suc- 
ceeding years  with  decreasing  probability  of  attainment.  Dur- 
ing the  administration  of  President  Madison,  it  was  almost  lost 
sight  of,  in  the  discussion  of  matters  of  more  immediate  and  ex- 
citing interest.  But  opposition  to  the  existing  order  of  things  in 
Connecticut  was  gaining  strength  and  was  no  longer  confined  to 
the  so-called  democratic  party;  and  when,  in  the  spring  of  1817, 
the  contest  was  actively  renewed,  the  friends  of  new  measures 
were  so  strong  in  numbers,  position,  and  influence,  that  success 

'Sidney1     Pn    -  [  N'ew  Haven].    8vo,  pp.  24. 

2  Just  before  this  election  was  published  a  pamphlet,  entitled  "  Steady 
Habits  Vindicated,"  etc  (Hartford,  1805).  8vo,  pp.  20.  Attributed  to 
David  Daggett. 


2,2  ECCLESIASTICAL    CONSTITUTION    OF   THE    COLONY. 

became  nearly  certain.  The  "  standing  order,"  in  church  and 
state,  had  now  to  encounter  a  determined  sectarian  as  well  as  a 
political  opposition. 

To  understand  the  character  and  extent  of  this  opposition,  it 
will  be  necessary  to  review,  briefly,  the  ecclesiastical  constitution 
of  the  colony  and  state.  The  foundation  of  this  was  the  act  of 
October,  1708,3  approving  the  confession  of  faith,  heads  of 
agreement,  and  regulations  in  the  administration  of  discipline 
agreed  to  by  the  synod  at  Saybrook,  and  enacting  that  all 
churches  thus  united  in  doctrine,  worship,  and  discipline,  should 
be  "  owned  and  acknowledged  established  by  law."  A  proviso 
assured  to  societies  and  churches  which  "  soberly  differ  or  dis- 
sent "  from  the  established  churches,  and  which  were  allowed  by 
law,  the  right  of  "  exercising  worship  and  discipline  in  their  own 
way  and  according  to  their  consciences."  But  dissenters  were 
not  thereby  relieved  of  their  obligations  to  pay  their  proportion 
of  town  taxes  for  the  support  of  the  established  ministry.  By 
a  colony  law  (May,  1697)  every  town  and  society  was  required 
to  provide,  annually,  for  the  maintenance  of  their  minister,  in 
accordance  with  the  agreement  made  at  settlement,  by  a  tax 
levied  "  on  the  several  inhabitants  according  to  their  respective 
estates."4  A  minister  settled  by  the  major  part  of  the  house- 
Iwldcrs  of  a  town  or  society  was,  by  a  law  passed  in  1699,  to  be 
accounted  the  lawful  minister  of  such  town  or  society,  and  the 
agreement  made  with  him  was  declared  to  be  binding  on  "  all 
of  such  town."5  And  when  in  1708,  the  general  assembly,  by 
an  act  "  for  the  ease  of  such  as  soberly  dissent  from  the  way  of 
worship  and  ministry  established  by  the  ancient  laws  of  this 
government  and  still  continuing,"  extended  to  all  qualified  dis- 
senters in  the  colony,  the  same  liberty  and  privileges  granted  by 
the  Toleration  Act  of  William  and  Mary,  it  was  with  the  special 
proviso,  that  this  should  not  be  construed  "  to  the  excusing  of 
any  person  from  paying  any  such  minister  or  town  dues  as  are 
now  or  shall  be  hereafter  due  from  them."6 

In  1727,  an  act  was  passed  directing  that  all  taxes  collected  for 
support  of  the  ministry,  from  members  of  the  church  of  Eng- 
land, should  be  paid  to  the  settled  ministers  of  that  church;  and 
if,  in  any  parish,  the  amount  so  paid  should  be  insufficient  to 


6 


Col.   Records,  v.  87.  4  Col.   Records,  iv.    198. 

Ibid.,  iv.  316.  a  Ibid.,  v.  50. 


LEGAL    RIGHTS    ()F    DISSENTERS.  33 

support  the  minister,  the  members  of  his  church  were  authorized 
to  tax  themselves  for  the  deficiency.7  Two  years  afterwards, 
similar  privileges  were  granted  to  Quakers  and  Baptists.8 

At  the  revision  of  the  laws  in  1784,  the  act  of  1708,  recogniz- 
ing "established  churches"  was  omitted;  and  in  October,  1791, 
the  general  assembly  passed  "  an  act  securing  equal  rights  and 
privileges  to  Christians  of  every  denomination,  in  this  State." 
Every  dissenter  who  should  lodge  with  the  clerk  of  an  ecclesias- 
tical society  a  certificate  of  having  joined  himself  to  any  other 
than  the  established  denomination,  was,  "  so  long  as  he  shall 
continue  ordinarily  to  attend  on  the  worship  and  ministry  in  the 
church  or  congregation  to  which  he  has  chosen  to  belong,"  ex- 
empted from  the  payment  of  society  taxes  for  the  support  of  pub- 
lic worship  or  the  ministry.  And  all  churches  and  congrega- 
tions of  dissenters,  so  formed,  were  empowered  to  tax  themselves 
for  maintaining  their  ministers,  building  meeting-houses,  etc.9 

This  —  so  thought  Judge  Swift  —  "  levelled  all  distinctions, 
and  placed  all  denominations  of  Christians  equally  under  the 
protection  of  the  law."10  It  was  not,  however,  so  favorably  re- 
garded by  the  dissenters.  They  complained  that  "  when  a  per- 
son attends  on  public  worship  in  no  religious  society,"  he  should 
be  taxed  in  the  located  society  in  which  he  lives.  The  located 
societies  had  a  right  by  law  to  tax  all  within  their  limits  who  did 
not  lodge  the  prescribed  certificates,  and  this  lodging  of  cer- 
tificates —  though  it  was  considered  by  the  general  assembly  as 
"  nothing  more  than  an  act  of  the  dissenter  to  inform  the  located 
society  that  he  does  not  belong  to  them,"  was  "  deemed  by  some 
of  the  dissenters  themselves,  a  mark  of  degradation  "  or  confes- 
sion of  inferiority.  While  the  law  professed  to  secure  equal 
rights  and  privileges  to  all  denominations  of  Christians,  it  main- 
tained, in  fact,  a  distinction  between  the  located  or  established 
and  the  dissenting  societies.  Moreover,  it  was  objected,  these 
were  differences  of  opinion  as  to  the  construction  of  the  law. 
"  As  it  was  always  in  the  power  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  located 
societies,  to  try  the  legality  of  the  certificates  of  dissent,"  dis- 
senters had  sometimes  —  as  Judge  Swift  admits,  —  "been  sub- 
jected to  hard  and  rigorous  usage.  Courts  and  juries  had 
usually  been  composed  of  what  was  considered   the   standing 

'Col.  Rec.  (MSS.)  vol.  v.,  p.  587.  8  Ibid.,  pp.  688,  704. 

"Revised  Statutes,   1808,  p.  575.  '"Swift's  System   (1795),  i.   144. 

3 


34  THE    DISSENTERS    COMPLAIN". 

church,  and  they  had  frequently  practised  such  quibbles  and 
finesse  with  respect  to  the  forms  of  certificates  and  the  nature 
of  dissenting  congregations,  as  to  defeat  the  benevolent  inten- 
tions of  the  law."2 

The  well-known  Baptist  elder,  John  Leland,  in  a  pamphlet 
published  soon  after  the  enactment  of  the  "  Certificate  Law  "  of 
1791,  denounced  it,  as  founded  on  the  principle  "that  it  is  the 
duty  of  all  men  to  support  the  gospel  and  worship  of  God,"  and 
that  "  human  legislatures  have  the  right  to  force  them  to  do  so." 
'  The  certificate  that  a  dissenter  produces  to  the  society-clerk, 
must  be  signed  by  some  officer  of  the  dissenting  church,  and 
such  church  must  be  protestant-christian;  for  heathens,  deists, 
Jews,  and  papists,  are  not  indulged  in  the  certificate  law;  all  of 
them,  as  well  as  Turks,  must  therefore  be  taxed  to  the  standing 
order,  though  they  never  go  among  them  or  know  where  the 
meeting-house  is."3 

Another  ground  of  complaint  was  found  in  the  peculiar  favor 
manifested  to  Yale  College,  which,  from  its  foundation  in  1702, 
had  been  under  the  exclusive  direction  and  control  of  the  con- 
gregationalists.  The  special  privileges  secured  to  the  college 
by  charter,  and  the  repeated  grants  which  had  been  made  to  it 
by  the  general  assembly,  were  regarded  by  the  dissenters  as  in- 
consistent with  the  concession  of  "  equal  rights  and  privileges 
to  Christians  of  every  denomination." 

The  Baptists  and  Methodists  had  repeatedly  addressed  them- 
selves to  the  general  assembly,  for  relief  from  the  operation  of 
laws  which  they  regarded  as  oppressive,  and  which  subjected 
them  to  the  compulsory  payment  of  taxes  for  the  support  of  any 
ministry  —  even  of  their  own  denomination.  They  demanded 
that  "  legal  religion  "  should  be  abolished,  and  "  the  adulterous 
union  of  Church  and  State,  forever  dissolved." 

The  Episcopalians  were  seeking  aid  from  the  State  for  the  en- 
dowment of  their  Academy  in  Cheshire  and  for  the  establish- 
ment of  a  fund  for  the  support  of  a  bishop.  In  the  former  ob- 
ject they  had  been  partially  successful,  obtaining  from  the  gen- 

2  Ibid.,  146,  147. 

3 "  The  Rights  of  Conscience  inalienable,  And  therefore  Religious 
Opinions  not  cognizable  by  Law;  or,  The  High-flying  Church-man, 
Stript  of  her  Legal  Robe,  Appears  a  Yaho  —  By  John  Leland."  New 
London,  1791  (8vo,  p.  30).  It  was  reprinted,  with  other  tracts,  by  Charles 
Holt,  New  London,  1802,  under  the  title  of  "  The  Connecticut  Dissenter's 
Strong-Box:     No.  I,  Containing  The  high-flying  churchman,  &c." 


THE    BISHOPS    FUND;    THE    PHOENIX    BANK    BONUS.  35 

eral  assembly,  in  October,  1802,  license  to  raise  15,000  dollars 
by  a  lottery.  An  act  incorporating  trustees  of  a  Bishop's  Fund 
was  granted  in  1799,  but  this  fund,  derived  from  private  contri- 
butions, grew  so  slowly  that  in  May,  1817,  it  hardly  exceeded 
6000  dollars.  When  the  charter  of  the  Phoenix  Bank  at  Hart- 
ford was  granted  (May,  1814),  the  State  exacted  a  bonus  of 
50,000  dollars.  The  trustees  of  the  Bishop's  Fund  alleged  that 
a  portion  of  this  bonus  had  been  appropriated  by  the  petition- 
ers for  the  bank,  to  the  benefit  of  the  fund,  and  they  complained 
that  it  was  unfairly  withheld  from  the  trustees,  while  an  appro- 
priation of  20,000  dollars,  from  the  same  bonus,  was  granted  to 
Yale  College.4  Another  ground  of  dissatisfaction  was  the  re- 
peated refusal  of  the  legislature  to  confer  the  powers  and  privi- 
leges of  a  college,  on  the  Academy  at  Cheshire,  or  to  charter  a 
new  Episcopal  College  of  Connecticut.  It  is  not  surprising  that 
the  federal  majority  —  members  of  the  "  standing  order,"  and 
warmly  attached  to  the  school  of  the  prophets  at  New  Haven  — 
hesitated  to  contribute  from  the  State  treasury  to  the  mainte- 
nance of  a  bishop  or  for  the  establishment  of  an  episcopal  rival 
to  Yale.  It  is  not  more  strange  that  the  episcopalians,  as  a 
body,  became  associated  with  the  republican  party,  from  which 
they  received  assurances  of  support.5 

In  October,  1816,  as  a  measure  of  conciliation  and  compro- 
mise, the  general  assembly  passed  "  An  Act  for  the  support  of 
Literature  and  Religion,"  by  which  the  balances  due  the  State 
from  the  United  States,  on  account  of  disbursements  for  the 
general  defence  in  the  war  with  Great  Britain,  were  appropriated 
as  follows:  one-third  to  the  Presbyterian  or  Congregational  so- 
cieties, to  be  divided  in  proportion  to  their  rate-lists,  for  the 
support  of  the  gospel;  one-seventh  to  the  trustees  of  the 
Bishop's  Fund,  "  for  the  use  and  benefit  of  the  Episcopalian  de- 
nomination of  Christians;  "  one-eighth  to  the  Baptists'  trustees, 
and  one-twelfth  to  the  Methodists'  trustees,  for  the«use  of  their 
denominations  respectively;  one-seventh  to  Yale  College;  and 

4  Eleven  years  afterwards  (1825),  the  State  granted  to  the  Trustees  of 
the  Bishop's  Fund,  $7,064.88,  in  commutation  of  their  claim  on  the 
Phcenix   Bank  honu 

•The  Rev.  Dr.  Shelton  ("rector  of  St.  Paul's,  Buffalo,  N.  Y.,)  in  a 
memoir  of  his  father,  the  Rev.  Philo  Shelton,  of  Fairfield  (1785-1825), 
thus  states  the  position  of  the  Episcopal  church  in  Connecticut,  in  the 
te  t  which  preceded  the  political  revolution  of  [817:  "  When  the 
Epjscopal  Church  petitioned  the  Legislature  in  vain,  as  she  did  for  a 
Beries  of  years,  for  a  charter  to  a  college,  he,  with  others  of  his  brethren, 


36  A   TOLERATION    TICKET    NOMINATED. 

the  balance,  a  little  more  than  one-sixth  of  the  whole,  to  remain 
in  the  State  treasury.6  As  might  have  been  anticipated,  this 
measure  pleased  nobody,  but  tended  rather  to  promote  than  to 
diminish  opposition  to  the  established  order  in  State  and  church. 
The  federalists  and  Congregationalists  felt  that  too  much  had 
been  conceded.  The  minor  sects  thought  the  division  unjust, 
and,  even  if  the  provisions  of  the  act  in  their  behalf  had  been 
more  liberal,  they  could  not,  consistently  with  their  past  profes- 
sions, approve  the  appropriation  to  the  support  of  the  ministry, 
of  a  fund  originally  raised  by  taxation.  Some  of  the  Methodists 
at  first  refused  to  receive  their  share  of  the  fund.  The  Baptists' 
trustees  did  not  accept  theirs,  till  June,  1820.  In  February, 
1818,  the  trustees  of  the  Methodists  —  a  majority  of  the  board, 
it  may  be  remarked,  were  federalists  —  voted  that,  though  that 
denomination  had  not  been  granted  their  full  proportion  of  the 
money  to  be  distributed  by  the  act,  yet,  not  thinking  it  right 
that  the  appropriation  should  remain  useless,  they  would  receive 
it  from  the  treasury.  This  action,  however,  was  strongly  cen- 
sured by  many  members  of  the  denomination  in  Connecticut. 

In  January,  1816,  "  a  meeting  of  citizens  from  the  various 
parts  of  the  State  "  was  held  at  New  Haven,  for  the  purpose  of 
nominating  a  governor  and  lieutenant-governor,  and  to  cement 
an  alliance  between  the  republicans  and  such  of  the  federalists 
as  were  opposed  to  the  "  standing  order  "  and  were  friends  of 
"  toleration  and  reform."  The  nomination  of  Oliver  Wolcott 
for  governor,  and  of  Jonathan  Ingersoll  for  lieutenant-gov- 
ernor, was  unanimously  agreed  on,  "  as  the  one  most  likely  to 
produce  that  concord  and  harmony  among  parties  which  have 
too  long,  and  without  any  real  diversity  of  interests,  been  dis- 

proposed  a  union  with  a  political  party,  then  in  a  minority,  to  secure  what  he 
regarded  a  just  right.  And  the  first  fruit  of  the  union  was  the  charter  of 
Trinity  [Washington]  College,  Hartford.  He  was  one  of  a  small  num- 
ber of  clergymen  who  decided  on  this  measure,  and  were  instrumental 
of  carrying  it  into  effect;  and  it  resulted  in  a  change  in  the  politics  of  the 
State  which  has  never  yet  been  reversed."  —  Sprague's  Annals  of  the 
Am.  Pulpit  (Episc),  v.  351. 

6  The  amount  received  from  the  U.  S.,  before  Nov.,  1817,  was  $61,500. 
This  was  apportioned  as  follows: 

To    Congregational    Societies $20,500.00 

Trustees  of  Bishop's  Fund 8,785.71 

Baptists'   Trustees 7,687.50 

Methodists'   Trustees 5- 125.00 

Yale     College 8,785.71 

Balance    unappropriated 10,616.08 


WOLCOTT   AND    INGERSOLL.  7)7 

turbed,  and  which  every  honest  man  must  earnestly  desire  to 
see  restored."7 

Oliver  YVolcott,  in  former  days,  had  been  a  federal  of  the  fed- 
erals. He  had  opposed  the  re-nomination  of  John  Adams  be- 
cause he  believed  that  "  we  should  never  find  ourselves  in  the 
straight  road  of  federalism  while  Air.  Adams  is  president."8 
While  secretary  of  the  treasury,  and  after  his  resignation  of  that 
office  in  1800,  he  had  been  charged  by  the  anti-federals,  not 
merely  with  maladministration  and  evil  counsel,  but  with  down- 
right crime,  and,  as  he  on  one  occasion  complained,  he  had  en- 
countered some  of  "  the  most  flagitious  and  profligate  devices  of 
party  malice."9  But  retirement  from  political  life  and  absence 
for  fourteen  years  from  Connecticut  had  given  old-time  resent- 
ments time  to  cool.  "  There  were  few  men  in  this  country  "  — 
as  republican  writers  now  truly  averred  —  "  who  would  more 
advantageously  bear  a  scrutiny  of  character  as  to  moral  qualifi- 
cations, than  Oliver  Wolcott."  Moreover,  "  he  was  opposed  to 
the  Hartford  convention;  like  Washington  was  a  friend  to  the 
Union,  a  foe  to  rebellion;  with  mild  means  resisted  bigotry,  with 
a  glowing  heart  favored  Toleration  ";10  and  as,  with  all  this,  "  he 
had  for  the  last  eight  or  ten  years  approved  of  the  general  sys- 
tem of  measures  adopted  and  pursued  by  the  government  of  the 
United  States,"11  he  was  deemed  an  available  candidate  of  the 
coalition.  The  Mercury  —  in  which,  fifteen  years  before,  he  had 
been  accused  of  setting  fire  to  the  buildings  of  the  War  and 
Treasury  departments  for  the  purpose  of  destroying  the  evidence 
of  his  frauds  and  defalcation1  —  cordially  supported  his  nomina- 
tion, and  challenged  the  federalists  "  to  produce  a  single  in- 
stance, throughout  his  whole  life,  of  impurity  of  motives  in  the 
discharge  of  his  public  service."2 

Jonathan  Ingersoll,  an  eminent  lawyer  of  New  Haven,  had 
been  a  member  of  the  council,  1792-1798,  and  a  judge  of  the 
superior  court,  1798-1801,  and  from  181 1  to  1816.  He  was  a 
federalist,  in  good  standing  with  his  party,  but  his  nomination  as 

'Araer.    Mercury    (republ.),    27th    Feb.,    [816.     The    Hartford    'rimes. 

Feb.,  spoke  of  the  new  "  American  Toleration  and  Reform"  ticket. 

one   "agreed   upon   with  alia]    to   the   conciliation   of 

political  parties,  the  harmony  of  the  different  religious  denominations, 

and  subsidence  of  tlie  spirit  of  intoleran 

p.  10  Admin,  of  Wash,  and  Adams,  ii.  482. 

'"  X.  Haven  I'  r,  and  Am.  Mercury,  tith  Feb.,  1817. 

"  "  An  in  Am.  Mercury,  26th  March,  [816. 

'  Am.  Mercury,  Feb.  ?tli  and  25th,  [801  Ed.,  25th  March,  1816 


38  TOLERATION    TICKET    SUCCESSFUL. 

lieutenant-governor  was  made  a  condition  of  the  support  of  the 
new  ticket  by  Episcopalians.  Judge  Ingersoll  was  a  prominent 
member  of  that  church,  and  the  senior  trustee' of  the  Bishop's 
Fund.  '  It  was  deemed  expedient,  by  giving  the  Episcopalians 
a  fair  opportunity  to  unite  with  the  republicans,  to  attempt  to 
effect  such  a  change  in  the  government  as  should  afford  some 
prospect  of  satisfaction  to  their  united  demands."3 

The  new  ticket  —  first  called  "  American,"  then  "  American 
and  Toleration  "  —  was  not  successful  in  the  spring  election  of 
1816;  but  the  diminished  majority  of  the  federal  candidates  fore- 
shadowed the  coming  revolution.  Judge  Ingersoll,  by  the  help 
of  federal  votes,  was  chosen  lieutenant-governor,  by  a  majority 
of  1,453.     Mr.  Wolcott  received  10,170  votes,  out  of  21,759. 

The  next  year,  the  same  nominations,  "  adopted  at  a  general 
meeting  of  the  friends  o>f  toleration,"  at  New  Haven,  in  October, 
were  again  submitted  to  the  freemen;  and  now,  Oliver  Wolcott 
was  elected  governor  by  a  majority  of  about  600,4  over  the  fed- 
eral incumbent,  John  Cotton  Smith.  Lieutenant-governor  In- 
gersoll, receiving  the  votes  of  both  parties,  was  re-elected  with- 
out opposition,  and  in  the  house  of  representatives  there  was  a 
decided  "  Toleration  "  majority.  The  council  —  chosen  from 
the  nominations  made  in  October  preceding  —  was  still  federal, 
and  without  its  concurrence,  the  radical  changes  to  which  repub- 
licans and  tolerationists  were  mutually  pledged,  could  not  be 
effected. 

The  first  act  passed  by  the  general  assembly  of  1817,  was  one 
"  securing  equal  rights,  powers,  and  privileges,  to  Christians  of 
every  denomination  in  this  State."  It  provided  that  any  person, 
separating  from  any  society  or  denomination  of  Christians  to 
join  any  other,  should,  on  lodging  a  certificate  of  the  fact,  with 
the  town  clerk,  be  exempted  from  taxation  from  any  future  ex- 
penses of  the  society  from  which  he  withdrew.  Every  society  of 
Christians  was  authorized  to  lay  taxes  for  the  maintenance  of 

3  "  Aristides,"  26th  March,  1816,  and  "  Episcopalian,"  in  Am.  Mercury, 
1 2th  March. 

4  The  legal  returns  gave: 

Wolcott,    13,655 

Smith,    13,119 

Scattering,    202      13,321 

Wolcott's   majority    334 

But  the  correction  of  some  errors  in  the  returns  increased  this  major- 
ity—  as  the  federalists  conceded  —  to  about  600. 


REPEAL    OF    THE    STAND-UP    LAW.  39 

ministers,  the  support  of  public  worship,  for  building  meeting 
houses,  &c.,  and  all  Christian  societies  were  to  "  have  and  enjoy 
the  same  and  equal  powers,  rights  and  privileges,  to  every  effect, 
intent,  and  purpose,  whatever." 

Even  this  concession  was  not  sufficiently  explicit  and  broad  to 
satisfy  the  minor  sects;  and  the  next  year,  another  bill  was  intro- 
duced, for  more  effectually  securing  equal  rights  and  privileges  to 
all  denominations.  On  the  question  of  referring  this  bill  to  a 
committee,  Mr.  (and  the  Rev.)  Daniel  Burrows,  of  Hebron,  said: 
"  It  was  stated  that  the  law  of  1817  was  designed  to  extend  equal 
rights  to  all  religious  denominations;  but  it  did  not  change  the 
thing;  it  did  not  effect  the  object  or  answer  the  design  of  the  ag- 
grieved party.  It  contained  no  declaration  which  would  enable 
them  to  have  recourse  to  the  same  measures  that  were  enjoyed 
by  the  standing  order."5 

In  October,  1816,  the  complete  success  of  the  Toleration  party 
was  assured  by  placing  in  nomination  their  ticket  for  Assistants. 
In  the  general  assembly,  they  had  again  a  majority  of  nearly  two 
to  one.  At  this  session,  the  obnoxious  "  Stand-up  Law  "  was 
repealed.  This  law  was  enacted  in  October,  1801,  to  regulate 
the  manner  of  voting  in  freemen's  meetings.  It  directed  that 
in  all  elections  by  ballot,  the  freemen  should  "  lay  their  ballots 
on  the  lid  "  of  the  box,  "  and  the  presiding  officer  on  being  satis- 
fied that  the  ballots  given  in  are  single,  shall  put  them  into  the 
box,"  &c.  And  further,  that  when  the  freemen  were  to  vote  for 
persons  to  stand  in  nomination  for  assistants  or  representatives  in 
congress,  they  were  first  to  be  seated,  and  when  any  name  was 
proposed  for  nomination,  those  who  would  vote  for  the  person 
so  named,  should  signify  it  by  rising.  If  the  accommodations 
would  not  admit  of  seating  all  the  freemen  present,  the  vote 
might  be  taken  "  by  holding  up  the  hand."  Every  freeman  was 
to  be  provided  with  a  number  of  slips  of  paper  "  equal  to  the 
number  which  are  by  law  to  stand  in  nomination  ";  and.  at  each 
time  of  his  voting,  by  rising  or  show  of  hand,  he  was  to  "  drop 
one  of  the  said  slips  of  paper,  that  he  may  not  be  exposed  through 
mistake  to  vote  for  more  than  the  prescribed  number."8  This 
law  —  which  deprived  the  freemen  of  the  privilege  of  secrel  bal- 
lot—  had  become  unpopular,  even  anion--  the  federalists.    To 


5D<  hi  Conn.  Courant.  '  Rev.  Statutes,  [808,  pp.  251,  252. 


40  "  CONSTITUTION    AND    REFORM." 

the  republicans  and  their  "  toleration  "  allies  it  was  odious  in  the 
extreme.7  It  had  been  a  favorite  subject  of  animadversion,  with 
their  orators  and  party  press.  It  was  one  of  the  few  real  griev- 
ances of  which  the  freemen  had  to  complain,  and  contributed, 
perhaps  as  much  as  any  other,  to  bring  about  the  political  revo- 
lution which  began  in   1817. 

In  April,  1818,  the  revolution  was  consummated,  by  the  re- 
election of  Wolcott  and  Ingersoll,  the  election  of  eight  new 
assistants,8  and  an  anti-federal  majority  in  the  house  of  repre- 
sentatives. 

In  this  election,  the  question  of  a  new  Constitution  was  a  rec- 
ognized —  in  fact,  the  main  issue.  During  the  winter  of  1817-18 
and  the  following  spring,  town  meetings  had  been  held  in  many 
of  the  towns,  for  expression  of  the  views  of  the  freemen,  and  to 
instruct  their  representatives  in  the  general  assembly  to  vote  for 
calling  a  convention  to  frame  a  constitution.  The  "  American 
and  Toleration  Ticket  "  of  1816,  and  "  Toleration  and  Reform 
Ticket  "  of  1817  —  this  year  appeared  under  the  name  of  "  Con- 
stitution and  Reform."  The  necessity  of  a  change  in  the  form  of 
civil  government  had  been  argued,  with  much  ability,  by  writers 
in  the  leading  republican  newspapers,  and  in  pamphlets  which 
were  liberally  distributed  throughout  the  State.9  The  American 
Mercury,  in  the  first  number  of  the  new  year,  began  the  publica- 
tion of  a  series  of  articles  on  "  The  Constitution,"  addressed  "  to 
the  People  of  Connecticut,"  on  the  benefits  to  be  anticipated 
from  the  proposed  reform  and  to  answer  objections  which  were 
urged  against  it.  The  writer,  in  his  first  communication,  admits 
that,  in  past  years,  "  the  minds  of  the  community  had  seemed 
generally  to  revolt  against  opening  the  question,  choosing  rather 
to  endure  existing  imperfections  than  to  throw  aside  the  present 
system,  —  lest  a  more  perfect  one  might  not  be  adopted."  But 
now,  it  appeared  that  all  such  apprehensions  were  removed,  and 
"  the  people  were  agreed,  almost  without  dissension,  that  some 

7  The  republicans  ascribed  the  authorship  of  this  law  to  Lieut.  Gover- 
nor (afterwards  Governor)  Treadwell.  See  "  Aristides,"  on  Conn.  Poli- 
tics, in  the  American  Mercury,  12  March,  1816. 

8  Wm.  Bristol,  Elijah  Boardmen,  David  Tomlinson,  Sylvester  Wells, 
John  S.  Peters,  James  Lanman,  Enoch  Burrows,  and  Peter  Webb.  Four 
of  the  old  assistants  were  re-elected:  Jona.  Brace,  Fred.  Wolcott,  Asa 
Chapman,  and  Elias  Perkins. 

9  One  of  these,  on  "The  Politics  of  Connecticut:  by  a  Federal  Re- 
publican" [George  H.  Richards,  of  New  London],  was  received  with 
much  favor  by  the  republicans,  and  widely  circulated. 


NEW  HAVEN  FEDERALISTS  FAVOR  REFORM.         41 

changes  were  expedient  to  adopt  our  government  to  the  princi- 
ples of  a  more  enlightened  age  than  that  in  which  it  was  formed, 
and  to  reconcile  it  with  the  institutions  which  surround  us." 

While  the  republicans  and  tolerationists  were  unanimous  in 
support  of  the  measure,  the  federalists  were  not  united  in  opposi- 
tion. In  several  towns,  prominent  members  of  the  federal  party 
concurred  in  the  vote  instructing  their  representatives,  or 
avowed  themselves  in  favor  of  a  new  constitution.  The  jealous 
rivalry  between  the  two  capitals  —  which  dates  from  the  union 
of  the  colonies  —  was  not  without  its  influence.  The  modern 
fiction  of  a  "  compact  "  by  which  the  enjoyment  of  a  state  house 
and  biennial  election-parades  was  guaranteed  to  New  Haven  for- 
ever, does  not  appear  to  have  yet  gained  even  local  credence; 
but  it  was  an  avowed  purpose  of  the  Tolerationists,  to  abolish  the 
October  session  and  provide  for  the  annual  meeting  of  the  gen- 
eral assembly  alternately  at  Hartford  and  New  Haven,  thereby 
placing  the  two  capitals,  as  nearly  as  might  be,  on  political 
equality.  The  prospect  of  gaining  such  an  advantage  of  a  rival, 
by  remodeling  the  constitution,  was  an  inducement  which  party 
ties  were  weak  to  resist.  Many  federalists  of  New  Haven  and 
its  vicinity  openly  favored  "  Constitution  and  Reform,"  or  were 
careful  not  to  manifest  their  opposition. 

At  a  town  meeting  in  New  Haven,  Dec.  29,  1817,  a  resolution 
instructing  the  representatives  "  to  use  their  interest  and  exer- 
tions that  measures  be  immediately  taken  for  forming  a  written 
constitution  of  civil  government,"  introduced  by  Henry  W.  Ed- 
wards and  advocated  by  Ralph  I.  Ingersoll  and  Isaac  Mills,  was 
passed  "almost  unanimously,"  and  the  Register,  in  publishing 
the  fact,  was  "  happy  to  add  that  many  of  the  most  respectable 
and  candid  of  the  Federalists  have  united  with  the  Republicans." 

Other  considerations  than  those  which  were  suggested  by  sec- 
tarian or  local  interests  contributed  to  weaken  federal  opposition 
to  the  projected  reform.  Circumstances  had  brought  promi- 
nently into  notice  the  most  serious  defect  of  the  old  constitution 
and  of  the  existing  form  of  government  —  the  omission  to  define 
or  limit  "  the  supreme  power  and  authority  of  the  State  "  which 
was  vested  in  the  general  assembly  without  any  reservation  oi 
judicial  authority  to  the  proper  cunts  of  law.  The  legislature 
had,  from  the  settlement  of  the  colony,  been  regarded  as  the 
court  of  ultimate  re  orl  in  all  matters,  civil  and  criminal.     It  had 


42  UNLIMITED    TOWERS    OF    THE    GENERAL    ASSEMBLY. 

for  a  long  time  reserved  to  itself  sole  jurisdiction  in  equity,  and 
had  not  yet  delegated  to  the  courts  the  power  of  granting  relief 
in  equity,  where  the  amount  in  controversy  exceeded  5,335  dol- 
lars.10 It  might  call  to  account  any  court  or  magistrate,  and,  for 
cause  found,  fine,  displace,  or  punish  them,  at  discretion;  and  its 
power  to  grant  pardons,  suspensions,  and  reprieves,  in  capital  or 
other  criminal  cases,  was  unquestioned.  It  was  natural,  there- 
fore, that  —  the  occasional  remonstrances  of  the  bench  notwith- 
standing —  the  opinion  should  be  maintained  by  many,  and  es- 
pecially by  those  who,  for  the  time,  were  invested  by  popular 
election  with  this  unrestricted  power  —  that  "  the  assembly,  by 
virtue  of  their  supreme  authority,  may  superintend  and  overlook 
all  inferior  jurisdictions,  and  may  proceed,  upon  the  principles 
of  abstract  right  and  perfect  justice,  to  grant  relief  to  the  people 
in  all  instances  in  which  they  have  sustained  wrong  in  any  possi- 
ble manner  whatever."11  And  here  was  danger  of  the  very  evil 
against  which  the  founders  of  Connecticut  sought  to  guard  them- 
selves and  their  posterity,  in  framing  the  constitution  of  1639  — 
the  "  way  which  leads  directly  to  tyranny,  and  so  to  confusion  " 
■ —  for,  as  Hooker  believed  —  when,  "  in  the  matter  which  is  re- 
ferred to  the  judge,  the  sentence  should  lie  in  his  breast,  or  be 
left  to  his  discretion,  according  to  which  he  should  go,  is  a  course 
which  wants  both  safety  and  warrant."12  Judge  Swift,  in  1795, 
though  he  characterized  those  who  pretended  that  Connecticut 
had  no  constitution,  as  "  visionary  theorists,"  did  not  overlook 
"  a  question  of  great  nicety  and  difficulty  [which]  arises  respect- 
ing the  constitutional  jurisdiction  of  the  general  assembly,  in 
controversies  of  a  private  and  adversary  nature."  Admitting 
that  the  assembly  "  possessed  the  power  of  doing,  and  directing 
whatever  they  shall  think  to  be  for  the  good  of  the  community," 
he  maintained  that  "  it  ought  to  be  deemed  an  inviolable  maxim, 
that  when  proper  courts  of  law  arc  constituted,  the  legislature  are 
divested  of  all  judicial  authority"1  But  in  the  absence  of  any  dis- 
tribution of  powers,  by  the  organic  law,  it  was  not  easy  to  effect 
the  separation  of  the  law-dispensing  from  the  law-making  power. 
In  181 5,  the  action  of  the  general  assembly  in  a  case  in  which 
Judge  Swift  (then  Chief  Judge)  was  nearly  concerned,  attracted 

10  Rev.  Statutes,  1808,  p.  550.    The  amount  was  fixed  as  the  equivalent  of 
1600  pounds,  the  limit  of  jurisdiction  by  the  revision  of   1784,  p.   192. 

11  Swift's  System   (1795),  i.  75.         "  Ante,  p.   7.  'System,  i.  74. 


JUDGE    SWIFT'S    VINDICATION".  43 

general  attention,  and  gave  occasion  to  the  publication  of  some 
excellent  "  Observations  on  the  constitutional  power  of  the  Leg- 
islature to  interfere  with  the  Judiciary  in  the  administration  of 
justice."2  At  the  October  session,  the  general  assembly  an- 
nulled the  judgment  and  set  aside  the  sentence  pronounced 
against  a  murderer  convicted  at  a  special  session  of  the  superior 
court,  at  Middletown  —  on  the  ground  that  the  court  was  irreg- 
ularly and  illegally  convened,  and  that  the  order  for  summoning 
the  grand  jury  had  been  illegally  issued.  The  chief  judge,  who 
presided  at  the  trial,  felt  himself  constrained  to  appeal  to  the 
public  in  vindication  of  his  judicial  character,  against  the  im- 
plied censure  of  the  assembly.  "  It  is  true,"  he  observes,  "  we 
have  no  written  constitution;  our  constitution  is  made  up  of  usages 
and  customs:  but  it  has  been  always  understood  that  there  were 
certain  fundamental  axioms  which  were  to  be  held  sacred  and 
inviolable,  and  which  were  the  basis  on  which  rested  the  rights 
of  the  people.  .  .  .  The  government  of  the  State,  like  most 
others,  is  divided  into  three  branches,  the  executive,  the  legisla- 
tive, and  the  judiciary.  These  are  co-ordinate  and  independent 
of  each  other,  and  the  powers  of  one  should  never  be  exercised 
by  the  other.  ...  It  ought  to  be  holden  as  a  fundamental 
axiom,  that  the  Legislature  should  never  encroach  on  the  jurisdic- 
tion of  the  Judiciary,  nor  assume  the  province  of  interfering  in 
private  rights,  nor  of  overhaling  the  decisions  of  courts  of  law." 
If  this  principle  should  be  disregarded,  "  the  Legislature  would 
become  one  great  arbitration,  that  would  ingulf  all  the  courts  of 
law,  and  sovereign  discretion  would  be  the  only  rule  of  decision  — 
a  state  of  things  equally  favorable  to  lawyers  and  criminals."* 

"  Peter  Lung's  case  "  gave  a  new  argument  to  the  advocates 
of  constitutional  reform,  and  the  Chief  Judge's  "  Vindication'1 
was  well  calculated  to  exert  influence  in  drawing  a  portion  of  the 
more  conservative  federalists  to  the  support  of  the  republican 
and  toleration  ticket  in  the  elections  of  the  two  following  years. 

The  election  of  1818  was  regarded  by  all  parties  as  decisive  — 
as  to  the  change  not  only  of  the  policy,  but  of  the  frame  of  gov- 
ernment.   When  the  assembly  nut  in  May,'  it  was  well  under 

1  "A   Vindication   of  the   calling   <>f   the    Special    Superior    Court,    at 
Middletown  .  .  .  for  the  trial  of   Peter    Lung  .  .  .  with   Observations" 
Windham,  1816,  8vo. 
\  Vindcation,  &c,  pj 
deon    1  on,  of  Fairfield,  wa  n  Speaker;   Elisha  Phelp  . 

of  Simsbury,  and  Samuel  A..  Foot,  oi  I  h<    hire,  clerk 


44  gov.  wolcott's  message,  1818. 

stood  that  its  principal  business  was  to  provide  for  calling-  a  Con- 
stitutional Convention.  Governor  Wolcott,  in  his  speech  to  the 
two  houses,  at  the  opening  of  the  session,  presented  this  subject 
to  their  consideration,  with  characteristic  fairness,  caution,  and 
good  sense: 

"  As  a  portion  of  the  people  have  expressed  a  desire  that  the 
form  of  civil  government  in  this  State  should  be  revised,  this 
highly  interesting  subject  will  probably  engage  your  delibera- 
tions. I  presume  that  it  will  not  be  proposed  by  any  one  to  im- 
pair our  institutions,  or  to  abridge  any  of  the  rights  and  privi- 
leges of  the  people.  The  State  of  Connecticut,  as  at  present 
constituted,  is,  in  my  opinion,  the  most  venerable  and  precious 
monument  of  republican  government,  existing  among  men. 
With  the  exception  of  less  than  two  years  from  its  first  settle- 
ment, embracing  a  period  nearly  coeval  wwith  the  revival  of  civil 
and  religious  liberty  in  Europe,  all  the  powers  of  government 
have  been  directly  derived  from  the  people.  The  governors  and 
counsellors  have  been  annually,  and  the  representatives  semi- 
annually elected  by  the  freemen,  who  have  always  constituted  the 
great  body  of  the  people.  Nor  has  the  manifestation  of  the 
powers  of  the  freemen  been  confined  to  the  elections.  They 
have  ever  been  accustomed  to  public  consultations  and  delibera- 
tions of  intricacy  and  importance.  Their  meetings  have  been 
generally  conducted  with  the  same  order  and  decorum  as  those 
of  this  assembly.  No  instance  is  known  in  which  a  single  life 
has  been  lost,  in  consequence  of  any  mob,  tumult,  or  popular 
commotion.  The  support  of  religion,  elementary  schools,  pau- 
pers, public  roads  and  bridges  —  comprising  about  eight-tenths 
of  the  public  expenses  —  has  been  constantly  derived  from  taxes 
imposed  by  the  votes  of  the  people;  and  the  most  interesting 
regulations  of  our  police  have  ever  been  and  still  are  enforced 
by  officers  deriving  their  powers  from  annual  popular  appoint- 
ments. 

"  Prior  to  the  establishment  of  American  independence,  the 
Charter  of  Charles  the  Second  of  England  was  viewed  as  the 
palladium  of  the  liberties  of  Connecticut.  It  surely  merited  all 
the  attachment  it  received;  for  whatever  had  been  the  claims  of 
the  British  crown  or  nation,  to  jurisdiction  or  territory,  they 
were  all,  with  nominal  exceptions,  surrendered  to  our  ancestors, 
by  that  instrument;  especially,  there  was  expressly  ceded  to 
them  and  their  posterity,  the  inestimable  privilege  of  being  gov- 
erned by  municipal  regulations  framed  and  executed  by  rulers 
of  their  own  appointment.  The  revolutionary  war  of  course 
occasioned  no  change  or  dissolution  of  our  social  system. 

"  Considered  merely  as  an  instrument  defining  the  powers  and 
duties  of  magistrates  and  rulers,  the  Charter  may  justly  be  con- 
sidered as  unprovisional  and  imperfect ;  yet  it  ought  to  be  recol- 


REPORT    OF    THE    COMMITTEE.  45 

lected  that  what  is  now  its  greatest  defect  was  formerly  a  pre- 
eminent advantage,  it  being  then  highly  important  to  the  people 
to  acquire  the  greatest  latitude  of  authority,  with  an  exemption 
from  British  interference  and  control. 

"  If  I  correctly  comprehend  the  wishes  which  have  been  ex- 
pressed by  a  portion  of  our  fellow  citizens,  they  are  now  desir- 
ous, as  the  sources  of  apprehension  from  external  causes  are  at 
present  happily  closed,  that  the  Legislative,  Executive,  and  Judi- 
cial authorities  of  their  own  government  may  be  more  precisely 
defined  and  limited,  and  the  rights  of  the  people  declared  and 
acknowledged.  It  is  your  province  to  dispose  of  this  important 
subject,  in  such  manner  as  will  best  promote  general  satisfaction 
and  tranquillity." 

The  House  of  Representatives  raised  a  select  committee  of 
five,  "  on  so  much  of  the  Governor's  Message  as  relates  to  a  re- 
vision of  the  form  of  civil  government,"  and  Messrs.  Orange 
Merwin  of  Xew  Milford,  David  Plant  of  Stratford,  Shubael  Gris- 
wold  of  East  Hartford,  Nathan  Pendleton  of  North  Stonington, 
and  Nathaniel  Griffing  of  Guilford  were  appointed  as  such  com- 
mittee. The  Council  passed  a  resolution  appointing  the  Hon. 
Elijah  Boardman  (Rep.)  and  Hon.  William  Bristol  (Tol.)  with 
such  gentlemen  as  might  be  designated  by  the  house,  as  a  joint 
committee,  —  and  sent  it  down  for  concurrence.  The  House 
refused  to  consider  it,  and  ordered  it  to  lie  on  the  table,  until 
the  committee  they  had  already  appointed  should  report. 
The  House  committee  presented  the  following  report: 

"  General  Assembly,  May  Session,  1818. 
"  The  Committee  appointed  on  that  part  of  His  Excellency 
the  Governor's  Speech  which  relates  to  a  revision  of  the  form  of 
Civil  Government  in  this  State,     Report: 

That  in  conducting  their  minds  to  a  result  on  this  deeply  im- 
portant subject,  your  committee  have  deemed  no  small  deference 
due  to  public  feeling  and  opinion.  From  resolutions  adopted  in 
many  towns,  and  petitions  from  a  respectable  number  of  our  fel- 
low citizens  in  others,  together  with  information  derived  from 
various  other  sources,  they  can  entertain  no  doubt  of  a  general 
manifestation  of  a  desire  for  a  revision  and  reformation  of  the 
structure  of  our  civil  government  and  the  establishment  of  a 
Constitutional  Compact. 

As  all  just  political  power  is  founded  cm  the  authority  of  the 
people,  and  instituted  for  their  safety  and  happiness,  a  free  and 
deliberate  expression  of  the  public  will  as  to  any  modification  of 
that  power  is  eminently  entitled  to  regard,  —  a  regard  strongly 
enforced  by  the  consideration,  thai  no  government,  whatever  in 
other  respects  may  be  its  character,  can  1m-  expected  to  produce 


46  RESOLVE. 

the  best  effects,  to  which  the  governed  are  not  attached  by  affec- 
tion and  respect. 

Although  the  political  happiness  which  has  been  enjoyed 
under  the  laws  and  government  of  this  State  affords  cause  for 
grateful  acknowledgment,  yet,  in  the  opinion  of  your  commit- 
tee, this  happiness  is  to  be  ascribed  to  other  causes,  rather  than 
to  any  peculiar  intrinsic  excellence  in  the  form  and  character  of 
the  government  itself.  Destitute  of  fundamental  laws  defining 
and  limiting  the  powers  of  the  Legislature,  the  citizen  has  no 
security  against  encroachments  on  his  most  sacred  rights,  and 
violations  of  the  first  principles  of  a  free  government,  except 
what  may  be  found  in  the  dependence  of  that  body  on  the  fre- 
quency of  popular  elections.  Yet  even  these  boasted  barriers 
against  arbitrary  power  may  at  any  time  be  prostrated  by  the 
Legislative  will.  What  sufficient  security,  then,  have  the  people 
against  the  most  extravagant  exercise  of  power  by  such  a  Legis- 
lature, always  liable  to  be  impelled  by  passion,  caprice,  and  party 
spirit,  or  to  be  influenced  by  intrigue  or  misinformation?  There 
is  none  to  be  found  in  the  theory  of  our  government,  and  experi- 
ence, to  which  we,  with  regret,  recur,  may  teach  us  that  there  is 
none  elsewhere. 

The  organization  of  the  different  branches  of  government,  the 
separation  of  their  powers,  the  tenure  of  office,  the  elective  fran- 
chise, liberty  of  speech  and  of  the  press,  freedom  of  conscience, 
trial  by  jury,  —  rights  which  relate  to  these  deeply  interesting 
subjects  ougiit  not  to  be  suffered  to  rest  on  the  frail  foundation 
of  legislative  will  or  discretion. 

Regarding  the  present  as  a  period  peculiarly  auspicious  for 
carrying  into  effect  the  wishes  of  our  fellow-citizens  on  this  im- 
portant subject,  —  a  period  in  a  great  measure  happily  free  from 
the  agitation  and  collision  of  party  spirit,  and  in  which  we  have 
the  advantage  of  the  instruction  which  experience  has  alike  de- 
rived from  the  excellencies  and  faults  of  the  Constitutions  of 
our  sister  States,  your  committee  beg  leave  to  recommend  the 
adoption  of  the  accompanying  Resolution. 

Per  order, 

Oraistge  Merwin,  Chairman. 

The  Resolution,  as  subsequently  completed,  by  filling  the 
blanks  left  by  the  Committee,  was  as  follows: 

Resolved  by  this  Assembly.  That  it  be,  and  it  is  hereby  recom- 
mended to  the  people  of  this  State,  who  are  qualified  to  vote  in 
Town  or  Freemen's  Meetings,  to  assemble  in  their  respective 
towns,  on  the  fourth  day  of  July1  next  at  9  o'clock  in  the  morn- 
ing at  their  usual  place  of  holding  Town  or  Freemens  Meetings, 
and,  after  having  chosen  their  presiding  officer,  then  and  there 
to  elect,  by  ballot,  as  many  delegates  as  said  towns  now  choose 
representatives  to  the  General  Assembly,  who  shall  meet  in  con- 

1  The  words  printed  in  italics  were  inserted  by  the  House. 


CALLING   A    CONVENTION.  47 

vention  at  the  State  House  in  Hartford,  on  the  4th  Wednesday 
of  August  next,  and  when  so  convened  shall,  if  it  be  by  them 
deemed  expedient,  proceed  to  the  formation  of  a  Constitution  of 
Civil  Government,  for  the  people  of  this  State:  a  copy  of  which 
Constitution,  when  so  formed,  shall  be  by  said  convention  forth- 
with transmitted  to  each  town  clerk  in  this  State,  to  be  by  him 
submitted  to  the  qualified  voters  in  the  town  to  which  he  belongs, 
assembled  at  such  time  as  said  convention  may  designate;  which 
time  shall  not  be  less  than  one  week,  nor  more  than  three  weeks 
from  the  rising  of  said  convention,  for  their  approbation  and 
ratification:  and  said  Constitution,  when  ratified  and  approved, 
by  such  majority  of  said  qualified  voters  convened  as  aforesaid,  as 
shall  be  directed  by  said  convention,1  shall  be  and  remain  the  Su- 
preme Law  of  this  State. 

And  be  it  further  resolved,  That  it  shall  be  the  duty  of  the  Se- 
lectmen in  the  several  towns  aforesaid,  to  give  legal  notice  of  the 
time,  place,  and  object  of  holding  town  meetings  as  aforesaid, 
whether  for  the  election  of  Delegates,  or  for  the  ratification  of 
the  Constitution :  and  the  votes  in  the  meetings  for  the  choice  of 
delegates  shall  be  counted,  and  certificates  of  election  shall  be 
supplied  to  said  delegates,  in  the  same  manner  as  is  now  prac- 
tised in  the  election  of  representatives  to  the  General  Assembly. 
And  the  presiding  officer  chosen  by  said  meetings  for  ratifying 
the  Constitution  as  aforesaid,  shall,  as  soon  as  may  be,  transmit 
by  the  representatives  of  their  respective  towns,  to  the  General 
Assembly  next  after  such  meetings  are  held,  a  certified  statement 
of  the  number  of  votes  given  in  said  towns,  on  the  question  of 
ratifying  said  Constitution,  both  affirmative  and  negative,  and 
a  like  statement  said  presiding  officer  shall  also  lodge  with  the 
town  clerks  of  their  respective  towns,  which  votes  shall  be  re- 
turned to  said  assembly,  and  counted  in  the  same  manner,  as  is 
by  law  provided  for  returning  and  counting  the  votes,  for  Gov- 
ernor of  this  State. 

And  be  it  further  resolved,  That  two-thirds  of  the  whole  num- 
ber of  delegates  so  elected,  shall  form  a  quorum,  and  said  con- 
vention shall  choose  a  president  and  clerk;  and  the  clerk  of  said 
convention  having  been  sworn  to  a  faithful  discharge  of  the 
duties  of  his  office,  shall  proceed  to  administer  to  the  president 
and  members  thereof,  the  following  oath  or  affirmation,  viz: 

"  You,  being  chosen  delegates  to  this  convention  for  the  pur- 
pose, if  need  be,  of  framing  and  devising  a  Constitution  of  Civil 
Government  for  the  people  of  the  State  of  Connecticut,  do  sol- 
emnly swear  (or  affirm)  that  you  will  faithfully  discharge  the 
trust  confided  to  you." 

And  said  delegates  shall  1"-  allowed  the  same  fees  for  travel 

and  attendance  OH  said  convention,  as  is  now  by  law  allowed  to 

the  Representatives  to  the  General  Assembly. 


48  AMENDMENTS    PROPOSED. 

Be  it  further  resolved,  That  all  such  persons  as  are,  or  may,  at 
the  time  of  either  of  said  meetings,  be  qualified  by  law,  and  duly 
certified  as  such,  by  the  lawful  board  for  said  purpose,  to  be 
made  freemen  of  this  State,  may  then  and  there  be  admitted  and 
sworn,  and  shall  be  authorized  to  act  as  such,  in  the  business  of 
said  meetings. 

An  unsuccessful  attempt  was  made  to  amend  the  resolution  — 
on  motion  of  Samuel  A.  Foot  —  by  substituting,  in  the  sixth 
line,  the  words  "  one  delegate,"  for,  "  as  many  delegates  as  said 
towns  now  choose  representatives  to  the  general  assembly." 
This  was  opposed  by  Mr.  Channing  of  New  London  and  Mr. 
Austin  of  New  Hartford,  and  was  rejected. 

To  a  motion  to  fill  the  first  blank,  by  fixing  the  "  fourth  day 
of  July  "  as  the  time  of  holding  the  freemen's  meetings  for  the 
choice  of  delegates,  Mr.  Griswold  of  East  Hartford  (Fed.)  ob- 
jected, because  this  was  a  holiday,  and  moreover,  the  fourth  of 
July  happened  this  year  to  fall  on  a  Saturday,  when  it  was  in- 
convenient to  the  freemen  to  attend  town  meetings.  Col.  John 
McClellan,  of  Woodstock  (Fed.)  "  could  not  agree  with  the 
gentleman  from  East  Hartford ;  he  knew  the  fourth  of  July  was 
a  merry  day,  but  he  thought,  if  the  people  began  early  in  the  morn- 
ing, they  would  be  able  to  get  through  before  they  were  disquali- 
fied to  vote"2 

On  filling  the  remaining  blank  —  thereby  determining  what 
majority  should  be  required  for  ratification  —  there  was  more 
diversity  of  opinion  and  longer  debate.  Mr.  John  Alsop,  of 
Middletown,  proposed  "  two-thirds  of  the  whole  number  of 
tozvns."  Mr.  James  Stevens,  of  Stamford,  proposed  "  three 
fifths  "  instead  of  "  two-thirds."3  Mr.  Austin,  of  New  Hartford, 
objected  to  both  propositions,  because  "  two-thirds  of  the  whole 
number  of  tozvns  might  not  contain  one-fourth  of  the  people." 
Mr.  Calvin  Butler,  of  Plymouth,  wished  to  substitute  "  four- 
fifths."  Mr.  Foot  preferred  to  leave  this  question  to  be  decided 
by  the  convention  itself.  Mr.  Jonathan  W.  Edwards,  of  Hart- 
ford, moved  to  fill  the  blank  with  the  words,  "  which,  when  rati- 
fied by  three-fifths  of  the  legal  voters  of  this  State,  assembled  in 
legal  town  meeting  warned  for  that  purpose,  shall  become  the 
Constitution  and  supreme  law  of  the  land,"  and  by  vote  of  the 
house  the  blank  was  so  filled.  But  the  bill  having  been  re- 
turned to  the  committee  for  revision,  they  reported  it  with  an 

2  Report  of  debates,  in  Conn.  Courant,  June  9th. 

3  Had  either  proposition  been  adopted  the  Constitution  would  not  have 
been  ratified.  It  received  in  October  a  majority  of  the  votes  in  only 
fifty-nine  of  the  one  hundred  and  twenty  towns. 


SPEECH    OF   J.    W.    EDWARDS.  49 

amendment  requiring-  only  a  "  majority  of  the  freemen,"  and  this 
amendment  was  accepted  by  the  house  —  by  a  bare  majority 
(yeas,  81 ;  nays,  80).  Air.  Foot  then  offered  another  amend- 
ment, providing  for  ratification  "  by  such  majority  of  the  quali- 
fied voters  as  shall  be  directed  by  said  convention"  and  this  was 
finally  adopted. 

The  resolution  was  supported  in  debate,  by  Mr.  Plant  of  Strat- 
ford, Mr.  Foot  of  Cheshire,  and  Mr.  Burrows  of  Hebron,  and 
opposed  by  Mr.  Griswold  of  East  Hartford,  and  Jonathan  \Y. 
Edwards  of  Hartford.  An  abstract  of  Mr.  Edwards*  speech, 
from  a  newspaper  report,4  may  appropriately  be  inserted  here, 
as  presenting  the  views  of  the  federal  minority  and  the  grounds 
of  their  opposition  to  a  change  in  the  form  of  civil  government : 

"  Mr.  Jona.  W.  Edwards,  of  Hartford,  said :  I  do  not  rise, 
Mr.  Speaker,  at  this  late  hour,  under  the  expectation  that  any 
observations  which  I  may  make  will  change  the  vote  of  a  single 
member  of  this  house ;  but  as  I  deem  it  my  duty  to  give  my  vote 
on  this  bill,  I  shall  not  hesitate  to  avow  the  reasons  by  which  I 
am  influenced. 

"  We  are  blessed  with  a  Constitution,  sir,  and  if  it  is  not  a  writ- 
ten one,  it  is  one  under  which  the  citizens  of  Connecticut  have 
enjoyed  more  peace,  more  happiness,  and  more  freedom,  than 
could  ever  be  boasted  of  by  any  other  people  under  any  other 
government.  Our  form  of  civil  government  has  remained  from 
1662,  almost  without  a  change.  It  was  in  its  first  outlines 
formed  by  all  the  free  male  inhabitants  of  the  three  towns  of 
Windsor,  Hartford,  and  Wethersfield.  Afterwards  the  Charter 
of  Charles  was  drawn,  in  this  town,  made  as  we  wished,  and  sent 
to  England  for  ratification.  It  rendered  us  independent,  and 
accordingly  we  were  governed  solely  by  laws  made  by  ourselves. 
The  royal  and  proprietary  governments  were  dissolved  by  the 
revolution  —  but  ours,  a  charter  government,  remained  unal- 
tered. The  first  charter  was  drawn  up,  perhaps,  about  the  spot 
where  I  now  stand.  It  was  drawn  up.  sir,  at  the  request  of  the 
people.  It  was  not  a  charter  of  King  Charles,  but  a  charter  of 
the  people,  and  under  it  we  have  always  exercised  all  the  powers 
of  government,  and  have  enjoyed  as  much  freedom  as  has  fallen 
to  the  lot  of  any  other  community.  The  assent  of  the  people,  by 
long  usage  and  acquiescence,  has  been  as  fully  expressed,  as  if 
the  votes  of  the  people  had  been  taken,  and  the  assent  is  less 
equivocally  expressed  than  even  by  a  voir.  What  advant 
then,  shall  we  gain,  sir,  by  a  written  Constitution?  A  written 
Constitution  app  1  me  to  be  of  no  value,  excepl  in  two 

,:   Fir  re  a  people  have  been  holden  in  servitude,  and 

rant.  June  9th, 


50  THE    CONVENTION    CALLED. 

have  obtained  their  freedom  from  their  sovereigns.  All  the 
people  of  Europe  have  emerged  from  a  state  of  vassalage ;  they 
were  once  the  dependents  of  their  military  chieftains,  and  the 
privileges  which  they  now  enjoy  were  extorted  by  degrees  from 
their  lords,  and  holden  by  charter.  To  such  a  people  a  written 
constitution  is  highly  important.  The  other  case  in  which  it  is 
proper  to  have  a  written  constitution,  is  where  several  sovereign 
states  are  united  under  one  general  and  federal  government.  It 
is  indispensably  necessary  to  have  the  limits  of  the  general  and 
of  the  particular  government  accurately  defined  by  a  written  con- 
stitution. The  State  of  Connecticut  is  not  composed  of  inferior 
sovereignties.  As  a  state,  it  is  one  and  indivisible.  Neither  do 
the  people  hold  their  liberties  from  the  grant  or  license  of  any 
lord  or  sovereign ;  they  are  of  themselves  free,  sovereign,  and 
independent;  they  can  never  be  more  free ;  they  cannot  even  form 
a  Constitution,  without  relinquishing  some  part  of  their  free- 
dom —  the  freedom,  at  least,  of  changing  their  laws  whenever 
they  are  dissatisfied  with  their  operation.  They  now  choose  one 
branch  of  the  legislature  half-yearly,  and  the  other  annually,  so 
that  no  law  will  probably  continue  in  force  more  than  six 
months,  and  certainly  it  cannot  more  than  one  year,  before  it 
will  be  abolished,  if  the  people  wish  it.  The  people,  therefore,  do 
not  ask  for  a  Constitution  —  and  those  who  are  now  in  power 
may  be  satisfied  with  uncontrolled  dominion.  They  surely  can- 
not wish  to  part  with  the  power  of  making  wholesome  laws  and 
regulations ;  and  they  will  not  admit  that  the  people  are  in  any 
danger  from  their  usurpations.  I  think,  sir,  we  have  nothing  to 
gain,  and  have  much  to  hazard,  by  an  innovation.  If,  however, 
we  must  have  a  Constitution,  I  would  postpone  it  till  the  next 
session  of  the  Legislature,  and  if  we  must  then  form  a  Constitu- 
tion, we  ought  all  to  join  and  make  it  as  perfect  as  possible." 

The  resolution  was  adopted  June  2d,  and  the  Assembly  ad- 
journed, on  the  6th. 

The  result  of  the  town  elections  on  the  fourth  of  July  assured 
a  considerable  majority  to  the  Tolerationists,  in  the  convention. 
Both  parties  had  placed  in  nomination  their  strongest  men,  and 
although,  in  a  few  towns,  sectarian  resentment  or  party  spirit 
prevented  the  election  of  some  whose  talents  and  experience 
qualified  them  to  take  a  prominent  part  in  the  work  of  recon- 
struction, yet  the  federalists  did  not  hesitate  to  admit,  that  "  the 
freemen  seemed  to  have  been  in  a  great  measure  impressed  with 
the  importance  of  the  subject,  by  selecting,  for  the  most  part, 
judicious  and  intelligent  men,  instead  of  furious  and  bitter  parti- 
sans," —  including  "  many  who  had  long  possessed  and  deserved 


THE    CONVENTION   ORGANIZED.  5 1 

the  confidence  of  their  fellow-citizens."  And  all  parties  con- 
curred in  expressions  of  confidence  "  that  the  wisdom,  patriot- 
ism, and  experience  of  the  members  of  this  Convention,  would 
enable  them  faithfully  and  satisfactorily  to  discharge  the  great 
and  responsible  duties  of  their  station  —  to  frame  a  Constitution 
that  will  be  acceptable  to  every  class  of  freemen."5 

Such  confidence  was  well-grounded.  Seldom,  if  ever,  has  any 
body  of  men  so  respectable,  by  the  character,  talents,  political 
experience,  and  good  sense  of  its  members,  been  convened  in 
Connecticut. 

The  federal  leaders  accepted  the  coming  constitution,  as  in- 
evitable, and,  refraining  from  any  parade  of  hopeless  opposition, 
directed  their  efforts  to  preserve  as  much  as  possible  of  the  es- 
tablished institutions  of  Connecticut  under  a  new  form  —  and 
distribution  of  the  powers  —  of  government.  "  Federalists," 
they  said,  "  are  far  enough  from  being  opposed  to  a  constitution, 
and  instead  of  being  '  enemies  to  it  '  [as  had  been  charged  upon 
them],  will  be  heartily  glad  to  co-operate  with  all  honest  repub- 
licans, to  form  such  a  constitution  of  civil  government  as  will 
secure  to  the  freemen  of  Connecticut  '  equal  rights  '  and  a  con- 
tinuance of  those  numerous  privileges  which  have  so  long  dis- 
tinguished the  people  of  this  State."6 

On  Wednesday,  August  26th,  the  Convention  met.  in  the  Hall 
of  Representatives  at  Hartford.  It  was  called  to  order  by  the 
Hon.  Jesse  Root  of  Coventry,  the  oldest  delegate  present,  and 
proceeded  to  the  choice  of  a  clerk.  Some  discussion  was  had, 
as  to  the  propriety  of  conferring  that  office  on  any  person  who 
was  not  a  member  of  the  Convention.  Thomas  Day,  the  secre- 
tary of  the  State,  was  the  leading  federal  candidate.  On  the 
first  ballot,  the  vote  stood:  James  Lanman,  37;  Thomas  Day, 
35;  Gideon  Tomlinson,  26;  Ralph  I.  Ingersoll,  21;  Timothy 
Pitkin.  18;  and  22  scattering.  Mr.  Lanman  was  chosen,  on  the 
third  ballot.7 

Governor  Wolcott,  who  came  as  one  of  the  delegates  from 
Litchfield,  was  elected  president  of  the  Convention. 

In  the  afternoon  of  the  same  day,  on  motion  of  Mr.  James 
Stevens,  it  was 


"Conn.  Courant,  July   14.   1818.     The  writer  estimates  the  Strength  of 
parties  in  the  Convention  at   105  Dcninc-rats.  05   Federalists. 
•Conn.  Courant,  June  21.  '  Ibid.;  Journal  of  Convention. 


52 


THE    DRAFTING    COMMITTEE. 


"  Resolved,  That  this  Convention  do  deem  it  expedient  to  pro- 
ceed at  this  time  to  form  a  Constitution  of  Civil  Government  for 
the  people  of  this  State." 


The  next  morning-, 
resolved  to  appoint, 
from  each  county,  to 
the  Convention.     Th 

For  the  county  of 

Hartford: 
New  Haven: 
New  London: 
Fairfield: 
Windham: 
Litchfield: 
Middlesex: 
Tolland: 


on  motion  of  Mr.  Robert  Fairchild,  it  was 
by  ballot,  a  committee  of  three  members 
draft  a  Constitution  and  report  the  same  to 
is  committee  was  constituted  as  follows : 


Sylvester  Wells, 
Timothy  Pitkin,  \S 
Elisha  Phelps, 

William  Bristol, 
Nathan  Smith, 
William  Todd,^/ 
Moses  Warren, 
Amasa  Learned,1*^ 
James  Lanman, 

Pierpont  Edwards, 
James  Stevens, 
Gideon  Tomlinson, 

Peter  Webb, 
George  Larned,  v 
Edmund  Freeman, 

John  Welch, 
Augustus  Pettibone, 
Orange  Merwin, 

Joshua  Stow, 
William  Hungerford, 
Thomas  Lyman, 

Daniel  Burrows, 
Asa  Willey,  \^ 
John  S.  Peters, 


of  Hartford. 

of  Farmington. 
of  Simsbury. 

of  New  Haven. 
« 

of  Guilford. 

of  Lyme. 

of  New  London. 

of  Norwich. 

of  Stratford. 

of  Stamford. 

of  Fairfield. 

of  Windham. 

of  Thompson, 
of  Mansfield. 

of  Litchfield. 

je>f  Norfolk. 

of  New  Milford. 

of  Middletown. 

of  East  Haddam 

of  Durham. 

of  Hebron. 

of  Ellington, 
of  Hebron. 

More  than  half  the  members  of  this  committee  had  already 
attained  honorable  distinction  in  professional  or  public  life. 
Others,  not  yet  so  well  known  to  the  people,  were  soon  to  be 
called  to  important  trusts  and  to  receive  the  highest  honors  in 
the  gift  of  the  State.  Pierpont  Edwards  —  who  was  chosen 
chairman  —  was  regarded  by  the  federalists  as  the  contriver  of 
the  coalition  by  which  democracy  came  into  power  under  the 
flag  of  "  toleration."  He  still  held  the  office  of  judge  of  the 
U.  S.  district  court,  to  which  he  was  appointed  by  Mr.  Jefferson. 
He  and  Mr.  Amasa  Learned  had  been  members  of  the  conven- 
tion which,  thirty  years  before,  ratified  the  constitution  of  the 
United  States.     Five  other  delegates  to  the  convention  of  1788, 


THE    DRAFTING    COMMITTEE.  53 

were  in  the  convention  of  1818,  namely,  Jesse  Root,  John  Tread- 
well,  Stephen  Mix  Mitchell,  Aaron  Austin,  and  Lemuel  Sanford. 
Five  members  of  the  committee  (Messrs.  Bristol,  Wells,  Peters, 
Lanman,  and  Webb,)  were  assistants.  Three  (Messrs.  Pitkin, 
Edwards,  and  Learned)  had  been  representatives  in  congress, 
and  five  others  (Messrs.  Phelps,  Stevens,  Tomlinson,  Merwin, 
and  Burrows)  were  afterwards  elected  to  that  office.  Gideon 
Tomlinson  and  John  S.  Peters  became,  in  turn,  governors  of  the 
State,  and  James  Lanman,  Nathan  Smith,  and  Tomlinson,  sen- 
ators of  the  United  States. 

Considering  the  hostility  to  Yale  College  which  had  been  man- 
ifested by  some  of  the  republicans  and  the  jealousy  with  which 
its  relation  to  the  State  was  regarded  by  dissenters  from  the  es- 
tablished order,  it  is  remarkable  that  so  many  alumni  of  Yale 
were  chosen  delegates  to  the  convention,  and  that  twelve  of  these 
were  placed  on  the  committee  (of  twenty-four)  to  draft  a  consti- 
tution.8 

Five  members  of  the  committee  were  taken  from  the  federal 
minority,  —  Messrs.  Pitkin,  Todd,  G.  Larned,  Pettibone,  and 
Willey.  Of  these,  Mr.  Pitkin  had  been  the  most  prominent  in 
his  party,  and  had  the  largest  experience  in  public  affairs.  He 
had  represented  his  town  in  twenty  sessions  of  the  general  as- 
sembly, had  been  five  times  speaker  of  the  house,  and  since  1805 
a  representative  in  congress.  Nathan  Smith,  of  New  Haven, 
though  a  federalist  by  conviction  and  affinity  (his  brother,  Judge 
Nathaniel,  was  a  delegate  to  the  Hartford  Convention  of  1814), 
was  now  —  as  an  episcopalian,  a  trustee  to  the  Bishop's  Fund, 
and  the  agent  of  his  church  to  obtain  an  appropriation  from  the 
State  —  associated  with  the  republicans  for  "  toleration  and  re- 
form." 

Among  the  delegates  to  the  convention  at  large,  were  three 
honored  chiefs  of  federalism  and  pillars  of  the  established  order; 
the  venerable  ex-chief-judges,  Jesse  Root  (now  in  his  eighty- 
second  year)  and  Stephen  Mix  Mitchell  (in  his  seventy-fifth),  and 

"Hon,  Nathan  Smith,  who  received  an  honorary  degree  of  A.M.  in 
1R08.  is  included  in  this  number.  Dr.  John  S.  Peters  was  a  fellow  of 
the  Connecticut  Medical  Society,  but  did  not  receive  from  Yale  the  de- 
gree of  M.  D.,  till  after  the  meeting  of  the  convention.  Two  mem- 
of  the  committee,  Messrs.  Lamed  and  Freeman,  were  graduates  of 
Brown  University.  Thirty-nine  delegates  to  the  convention  were  alumni 
or  honoraries  of  Yale.  William  Hungerford,  of  the  class  of  1800,  and 
Thomas  Lyman,  of  1810,  were  the  two  youngest  graduates  on  the  com- 
mit1' 


54  THE    CONVENTION. 

ex-governor  Treadwell  (in  his  seventy-third).  Gen.  Nathaniel 
Terry,  of  Hartford,  divided  with  Gov.  Treadwell  the  leadership  of 
the  party  in  the  convention.  The  Hon.  Aaron  Austin  of  New 
Hartford,  another  federal  delegate,  had  sat  with  the  assistants  at 
the  council-board  for  nearly  a  quarter  of  a  century,  till  displaced 
by  the  revolution  of  1818.0  The  Hon.  Wm.  Perkins  of  Ashford, 
Col.  Shubael  Griswold  of  East  Hartford,  Gen.  Levi  Lusk  of 
Wethersfield,  the  Rev.  Aaron  Church  of  Hartland,  Henry  Terry, 
Esq..  of  Enfield,  Col.  John  McClellan  of  Woodstock,  were  well 
known  as  federalists  and  friends  to  the  established  order. 

On  the  side  of  Toleration  and  Reform,  prominent  among  the 
original  republicans  and  their  recognized  leader,  was  Alexander 
Wolcott,  of  Middletown,  a  Jeffersonian  democrat  of  the  most 
pronounced  type,  who,  "  more  than  any  other  individual,  de- 
serves to  be  considered  as  the  father  and  founder  of  the  Jeffer- 
sonian school  of  politics  in  this  State."10  The  Rev.  Asahel 
Morse  (Baptist)  of  Sufheld,  the  sometime  Rev.  Daniel  Burrows 
(Methodist)  of  Hebron,  Joshua  Stow  of  Middletown  —  whose 
misadventure  with  the  republican  circular  in  1806,  supplied  the 
federalists  with  some  capital  and  gave  his  "  saddle  bags  "  a  place 
is  political  history,1  —  Gen.  Joshua  King  of  Ridgefield,  David 
Tomlinson  of  Oxford,  one  of  the  new  Toleration  councillors, 

8  His  town  gave  only  34  votes  for  —  to  156  against  —  the  Constitution, 
in  October. 

10  Hon.  John  M.  Niles;  quoted  in  Stiles's  History  of  Windsor,  p.  834. 
The  federalists  of  1800  to  1817,  though  they  would  not  have  hesitated 
to  concede  this  position  to  the  "  State  Manager  "  of  his  party,  would 
hardly  have  accepted,  without  dissent,  Mr.  Niles'  eulogy  of  Alex.  Wol- 
cott, as  a  man  who,  "  always  frank  in  his  purposes,  was  equally  direct 
in  his  means,  despising  chicanery  and  artifice,  the  constant  resource  of 
feeble  minds." 

1  "  Joshua  Stow,  whom  the  State  Manager  [Wolcott]  had  appointed 
County  Manager,  lost  his  saddle  bags  filled  with  copies  of  the  general 
orders.  They  fell  into  the  hands  of  gentlemen  who  had  no  interest  to 
promote,  by  secrecy,  and  thus  they  were  published  in  the  federal  papers." 
—  The  Sixth  of  August,  or  the  Litchfield  Festival,  [Hartford]   1806,  p.  II. 

'  These  men  have  reduced  their  plan  to  a  system,  and  they  are  com- 
pletely organized  and  officered.  This  is  fully  evidenced,  by  a  circular  let- 
ter, from  their  Chief  Manager.  This  letter  was  a  business  of  secrecy, 
but  providentially  discovered;  it  was  safely  committed  by  the  post,  to  the 
portmanteau  on  the  horse;  but  the  horse,  like  Absalom's  Ass,  despised 
his  burden,  and  frighted  at  the  contents,  broke  his  fast  and  ran,  till  the 
letter  was  dislodged  in  the  street.  Here  were  peremptory,  yea,  sovereign 
orders  given  to  every  town  manager,"  &c.  "  What  friend  to  his  country 
can  read  the  Manager's  letter  without  alarm?  If  so,  he  must  have  less 
feeling  than  the  horse,  who  generously  communicated  the  contents  to  the 
public."  —  The  Two  Brothers:  a  Dialogue.     Hartford,   1806,  p.   12. 


DISCUSSION    ON    THE    BILL    OF    RIGHTS.  55 

Christopher  Manwaring,  of  New  London,  were  republicans  such 
as  partisan  speakers  of  our  time  are  wont  to  honor  as  the  "  old 
war  horses  "  of  democracy.  Several  of  the  most  distinguished 
members  of  the  party  —  besides  those  already  mentioned  —  were 
on  the  drafting  committee.  Besides  Dr.  Sylvester  Wells  and  Dr. 
John  S.  Peters,  (both  members  of  that  committee,)  there  were  in 
the  convention  at  least  a  dozen  physicians,  nearly  all  on  the  tol- 
eration side :  Dr.  Shelton  of  Huntington,  Perry  of  Woodbury, 
Turner  of  Norwich,  Lacey  of  Brookfield,  Jehiel  Williams  of  New 
Milford,  and  others :  Drs.  Bela  Farnham  of  East  Haven,  and  S. 
Everest  of  Canton  were  with  the  federalists. 

Mr.  Lanman  having  been  placed  on  the  drafting  committee,  it 
became  necessary  to  provide  an  assistant  clerk  for  the  conven- 
tion, and  Robert  Fairchild  was  chosen. 

On  Friday,  Aug.  28th,  the  committee,  by  their  chairman,  made 
a  partial  report,  submitted  a  Preamble,  and  a  Bill  of  Rights,  be- 
ing Article  I.  of  the  Constitution.  The  discussion  which  ensued 
—  unimportant  in  itself  —  indicated  the  result  at  which  the  con- 
vention, constituted  as  it  was,  must  almost  of  necessity  arrive. 
It  was  evident  that  the  new  constitution  was  not  to  be  fashioned 
as  an  engine  or  a  platform  of  party.  The  tolerationists  —  many 
of  whom  were  drawn  from  the  federal  ranks  —  would  accept  the 
republicanism  of  their  allies,  but  stopped  short  of  pure  democracy. 
All  that  was  vital  in  the  first  constitution  and  the  charter,  was 
to  be  preserved  in  the  new  frame  of  government.  "  The  great 
and  essential  principles  of  liberty  and  free  government  "  would 
be  recognized  and  established,  but  the  liberty  must  be  enjoyed 
under  the  restraints  of  established  law. 

Gov.  Treadwell,  for  the  old  federalists,  and  Alex.  Wolcott,  for 
the  democrats,  opposed  the  incorporation  of  any  bill  of  rights  in 
the  constitution.  The  former  argued  that,  "  such  a  declaration 
of  rights  might  be  proper  and  expedient,  or  even  necessary,  if  we 
had  to  contend  with  a  tyrant,  or  an  aristocracy  disposed  to  wrest 
from  the  people  their  rights,  —  but  it  was  well  known,  that  all 
power  is  vested  in  the  people  and  exercised  by  a  government  ap- 
pointed by  the  people.  Was  it  then  necessary  to  make  certain 
regulations  for  that  government  which  sli« >nl<1  Ik-  unalterable f"1 

1  Debates  in  Conn.  Conrant.     Gov.  Treadwell's  argument  is  tin-  same 
which  Alex.  Hamilton  presented  in  The  Federalist,  No.  lxxxiv.  (Daw- 
'a  < ■']..  p.  598,  fT.). 


56  RIGHTS    OF    CONSCIENCE. 

Mr.  Wolcott  objected  to  such  a  bill,  because  it  circumscribed  the 
powers  of  the  general  assembly,  and  offered  specific  objections 
to  several  clauses. 

When  the  fourth  section  —  "  no  preference  shall  be  given  by 
law  to  any  religious  sect  or  mode  of  worship  "  —  was  under  dis- 
cussion, the  Rev.  Asahel  Morse  offered  the  following  substitute : 

"  That  rights  of  conscience  are  inalienable ;  that  all  persons 
have  a  natural  and  indefeasible  right  to  worship  Almighty  God 
according  to  their  own  consciences ;  and  no  person  shall  be  com- 
pelled to  attend  any  place  of  worship,  or  contribute  to  the  sup- 
port of  any  minister,  contrary  to  his  own  choice." 

The  substitute  was  opposed  by  Mr.  Pitkin  and  Gov.  Treadwell, 
(feds.)  and  by  P.  Edwards  (repub.),  and  was  rejected.  A  mo- 
tion was  afterwards  made,  to  amend  by  adding  the  last  clause  of 
Mr.  Morse's  proposed  substitute.  This  also  was  rejected.  On 
the  motion  of  Gov.  Treadwell  —  opposed  by  Alex.  Wolcott,  but 
sustained  by  Pierpont  Edwards  and  Nathan  Smith,  —  the  word 
"  Christian  "  was  substituted  for  "  religious."  With  this  amend- 
ment the  section  was  approved  and  adopted,  notwithstanding  the 
opposition  of  Messrs.  Wolcott,  Burrows,  and  Joshua  Stow.2 

The  second,  third,  and  fourth  articles  were  reported  by  the 
committee  on  Tuesday,  September  I. 

Their  final  report,  comprising  Articles  VII.  to  XL  inclusive, 
was  presented  on  Friday,  September  4th. 

Each  article  was  considered  by  the  convention  —  first,  by  sec- 
tions ;  then,  after  discussion  and  amendment  of  the  several  sec- 
tions, the  whole  article  was  again  open  to  amendment  before  the 
question  was  taken  on  its  adoption.  And  when  the  several 
Articles  had  been,  in  turn,  approved,  the  whole  instrument,  hav- 
ing been  printed  as  amended,  was  again  subjected  to  revision  and 
amendment  before  receiving  the  final  approval  of  the  convention. 

The  seventh  Article  —  "  Of  Religion  "  —  was  the  subject  of 
protracted  and  lively  debate.  The  federalists  contested  its  pas- 
sage, at  every  point,  and  succeeded  in  modifying,  in  important 
particulars,  the  draft  of  the  committee,  but  they  could  not  pre- 
vent the  complete  severance  of  church  from  state,  the  constitu- 
tional guaranty  of  the  rights  of  conscience,  or  the  recognition  of 
the  absolute  equality,  before  the  law,  of  all  Christian  denomina- 
tions. 
2  Debates,  in  Conn.  Courant,  and  Journal  of  the  Convention. 


DEBATE    ON    THE    SEVENTH    ARTICLE.  57 

To  the  first  clause,  as  reported :  "  It  being  the  right  and  duty 
of  all  men  to  worship  the  Supreme  Being,  the  great  Creator  and 
Preserver  of  the  Universe,  in  the  mode  most  consistent  with  the 
dictates  of  their  consciences"  —  Gov.  Treadwell  objected,  that 
"  conscience  may  be  perverted,  and  man  may  think  it  his  duty  to 
worship  his  Creator  by  image,  or  as  the  Greeks  and  Romans  did ; 
and  though  he  would  tolerate  all  modes  of  worship,  he  would  not 
recognize  it  in  the  Constitution,  as  the  duty  of  a  person  to  wor- 
ship as  the  heathen  do : "  and  Mr.  Tomlinson  subsequently 
moved  to  amend  this  clause  to  the  shape  in  which  it  now  stands 
("  the  duty  of  all  men  to  worship  .  .  .  and  their  right  to  ren- 
der that  worship,"  &c.)  Gov.  Treadwell  also  objected,  that  this 
clause  "  goes  to  dissolve  all  ecclesiastical  societies  in  this  State," 
—  and  this  was  doubtless  the  intent  of  its  framers.  Mr.  Stow 
thought,  "  if  this  section  is  altered  in  any  way,  it  will  curtail  the 
great  principles  for  which  we  contend."3  The  committee's  draft 
was  supported,  in  debate,  by  Alex.  Wolcott,  Mr.  Tomlinson, 
Daniel  Burrows,  Pierpont  Edwards,  Messrs.  Waldo,  Hart,  Ste- 
vens, and  Lanman,  and  opposed  by  Gov.  Treadwell,  Nathaniel 
Terry,  and  Timo.  Pitkin.  The  first  section  was  adopted  by  a 
vote  of  103  to  86,  and  a  motion  by  Mr.  Pitkin  to  strike  out  the 
whole  of  the  second  section  was  rejected  by  105  to  84. 4  These 
votes  indicate,  nearly,  the  relative  strength  of  parties  in  the  con- 
vention. On  the  final  revision  of  the  constitution,  Mr.  Terry 
offered  two  amendments  to  the  first  section  —  the  effect  of  which 
was  to  continue  the  old  ecclesiastical  societies  and  to  secure  their 
legal  rights  and  privileges  as  corporate  bodies :  and  these  amend- 
ments were  adopted  by  the  convention,  without  a  call  of  the 
yeas  and  nays.5 

"This  article  (as  I  was  informed  by  the  late  Mr.  Hungerford)  was 
assigned  by  the  drafting  committee  to  Messrs.  Gideon  Tomlinson  and 
Joshua  Stow.  Its  first  clause,  as  reported,  seems  to  have  been  taken,  with 
slight  change  of  language,  from  Gov.  Wolcott's  speech  to  the  general 
mbly  in  May,  1817:  "  It  is  the  right  and  duty  of  every  man  publicly 
and  privately  to  worship  and  adore  the  Supreme  Creator  and  Preserver 
of  the  Universe,  in  the  manner  most  agreeable  to  the  dictates  of  his  own 
conscience."  The  statement  has  been  repeatedly  made,  by  writers  whose 
authority  is  entitled  to  respect,  that  "  the  Article  on  Religious  Liberty 
in  the  Constitution  was  drawn  up  by  the  pen  of  Rev.  Asahel  Morse,"  a 
Baptist  minister  in  Sufficld,  who  was  a  delegate  to  the  Convention.  This 
is  manifestly  incorrect  —  unless  Mr.  Morse  was  the  draftsman  of  the 
governor's  speech  in  1X17.  As  is  mentioned  above,  Mr.  Morse  offered 
a  substitute  for  the  fourth  section  of  the  bill  of  rights,  but  this  was  re- 
jected. 

I ''hates   in    Conn.    Courant,   Sept.   22d;   and   Journal,   pp.   4Q-54. 

5  Journal,  p.  07. 


58  THE    CONSTITUTION    ADOPTED. 

On  Tuesday,  September  15th,  "the  draft  of  the  Constitution, 
as  amended  and  approved  when  read  by  sections,  was  read 
through  for  the  last  time  before  the  final  question  of  acceptance 
or  rejection.  The  Constitution  was  then  accepted  and  approved 
by  yeas  and  nays,  —  Yeas,  134;  Nays,  61." 

The  names  of  Nathaniel  Terry,  Judge  Mitchell,  William  Todd, 
John  McClellan,  and  other  prominent  federalists,  are  found 
among  the  yeas ;  while  those  of  Alex.  Wolcott,  James  Stevens, 
and  Robert  Fairchild  are  with  the  nays. 

After  the  vote  was  taken,  a  resolution,  offered  by  Gideon 
Tomlinson,  was  passed  by  the  convention,  directing  that  the  en- 
grossed copy  of  the  Constitution  should  be  signed  by  the  presi- 
dent and  countersigned  by  the  clerks,  and  deposited  in  the  office 
of  the  Secretary  of  the  State ;  that  seven  hundred  copies  should 
be  distributed  by  the  Secretary,  to  the  several  towns ;  "  and  that 
the  number  required  to  approve  and  ratify  said  constitution,  be 
a  majority  of  the  qualified  voters  present  and  voting  "  at  the 
town  meetings  to  be  held  on  the  first  Monday  in  October,  agree- 
ably to  the  Resolution  of  the  General  Assembly  by  which  the 
convention  was  called. 

Unsuccessful  attempts  to  amend  the  last  clause  of  this  resolu- 
tion, were  made,  by  motions  to  substitute,  for  the  majority  requi- 
site to  ratification,  three-fifths,  —  four-sevenths,  —  and  five- 
ninths,  of  the  number  of  votes  given. 

The  engrossed  copy  of  the  Constitution  having  been  signed, 
by  the  president  and  clerks,  and  delivered  to  the  Secretary,  on 
Wednesday  morning,  September  16th,  the  Convention  ad- 
journed, after  a  session  of  three  weeks. 

Fortunately,  for  the  best  interests  of  the  State,  the  Constitu- 
tion now  submitted  to  the  votes  of  the  people,  was  not  altogether 
such  as  either  federalists  or  republicans  wished  to  make  it.  In 
all  its  more  important  features,  it  was  the  result  of  compromise 
between  radical  democracy  and  the  conservative  federalism 
which  held  to  old  institutions,  to  established  order,  and  to  the 
"  steady  habits  "  which  had  given  a  name  and  character  to  Con- 
necticut. Moderate  men,  of  all  parties,  were  content  with  the 
work  of  the  convention.  To  the  republicans,  generally,  the 
overthrow  of  "  charter  government  "  was  a  triumph  —  even 
though  the  reforms  to  be  effected  thereby  were  less  sweeping 
than  they  had  hoped  to  make  them.     The  so-called  toleration 


RATIFICATION    BY   THE    PEOPLE.  59 

party  had  gained  the  ends  at  which  they  professed  to  aim,  in  the 
guaranty  of  perfect  religious  liberty  and  the  enjoyment  of  "  the 
same  and  equal  powers,  rights,  and  privileges  "  by  all  denomi- 
nations of  Christians.  Jeffersonian  democrats  of  the  old  school 
were  not  so  well  satisfied.  Alexander  Wolcott,  as  we  have  seen, 
voted  against  the  amended  draft.  "  The  deliberations  and  con- 
clusions of  a  majority  of  the  convention  were  not  such  as  to  com- 
mend themselves  to  the  enlarged  comprehension,  the  progres- 
sive republican  mind,  and  high  expectations  of  Wolcott,"  —  so 
wrote  his  friend  and  eulogist,  himself  one  of  the  most  distin- 
guished of  Wolcott's  successors  in  the  leadership  of  his  party : 
'  The  Constitution  as  presented,  he  discovered  as  defective,  as 
unjust,  as  founded  on  no  basis  of  republican  equality,  as  avoid- 
ing in  important  particulars  accountability  and  responsibility,  as 
a  mere  embodiment  of  the  charter  of  1662,  which,  though  liberal 
in  its  day,  was  not  adapted  to  present  circumstances  and  the 
changed  condition  of  the  country  and  times  in  1818."6 

Ratification  by  the  people  was  for  some  time  doubtful.  As  is 
always  the  case  where  a  compromise  is  effected  by  mutual  con- 
cessions, the  proposed  constitution  encountered  warm  opposi- 
tion without  receiving  from  its  friends  of  either  party  very  zeal- 
ous support.  A  federal  editor,  reviewing  the  work  of  the  con- 
vention, expressed  what  appears  to  have  been  the  general  senti- 
ment: 

'  We  can  say  with  truth,  that  many  of  the  members  with 
whom  we  have  conversed,  dislike  it,  and  though  they  voted  for  it, 
as  a  choice  of  evils,  did  not  consider  themselves  pledged  to  sup- 
port it  in  town  meeting."7 

So  many  of  the  democrats  were  dissatisfied  with  it,  that  but 
for  the  help  of  a  considerable  portion  of  the  federal  party,  it 
must  have  failed  of  ratification.  The  federal  delegates  who  had 
voted  for  it  in  convention,  nearly  all  supported  it,  in  good  faith, 
when  submitted  to  the  people,  and  their  example  and  influence 
brought  it  many  federal  votes.8 


on.  John  M.   Xiles,  as  quoted  in  Stilcs's  History  <>f  Windsor,  p.  835. 

(  Miiii.  ( '..iirant.  Sept.  22. 

"The   late   Seth    P.    Beers,   who   was   one   of   the   last    survivors   of   the 

toleration  leaders  of  1818,  expn  jsed  to  me  (1862)  liis  decided  belief  that 

Gen.  Nathaniel  Terry,  by  personal  and  political  influence,  did  more  than 

any  other  individual   t..     ecure  a  majority  For  ratification — and  that  had 

ed  tli.    constitution,  it  could  not  have  escape,!  defeat. 


60  BECOMES    THE    SUPREME    LAW. 

On  the  first  Monday  (fifth)  of  October,  the  constitution  was 
ratified  by  the  freemen  by  a  majority  of  1,554,  in  a  vote  of 
26,282.°     By  counties  the  vote  stood  as  follows : 


Yeas. 

Nays. 

Hartford, 

2,234 

2,843 

New  Haven, 

2,385 

1,572 

New  London, 

1,740 

792 

Fairfield, 

1,836 

1,019 

Windham, 

1.777 

1,671 

Litchfield, 

2,027 

2,779 

Middlesex, 

1,051 

786 

Tolland,   . 

868 

902 

13,918  12,364 

The  four  southern  counties,  New  Haven,  New  London,  Fair- 
field, and  Middlesex,  with  a  vote  of  11,181,  gave  a  majority  for 
ratification  of  2,843  !  tne  northern  tier,  Hartford,  Windham, 
Litchfield,  and  Tolland,  with  a  vote  of  15,101,  gave  a  majority 
of  1,289  against  ratification. 

When  the  votes  had  been  counted,  at  the  October  session, 
the  Assembly  requested  the  governor  to  issue  his  proclamation 
declaring  that  the  constitution  had  been  duly  ratified,  and  the 
Secretary  was  directed  to  cause  the  constitution  to  be  engrossed 
on  parchment  and  enrolled,  with  the  State  seal  affixed,  and 
deposited  in  his  office.  Governor  Wolcott's  proclamation  was 
issued  on  the  twelfth  of  October,  and  thereafter,  "  the  Constitu- 
tion of  civil  government  for  the  People  of  the  State  of  Connecti- 
cut, framed  by  a  Convention  and  published  on  the  fifteenth  day 
of  September  last,"  was  "  to  be  observed  by  all  persons  whom 
it  doth  or  may  concern,  as  the  Supreme  Lazv  of  this  State." 

As  Abraham  Bishop  predicted  in  1804,  the  "  Constitution  gave 
a  death  blow  to  Connecticut  federalism  "  —  that  is,  to  that  type 
of  federalism  which  identified  itself  with  the  established  order  in 
the  church,  and  believed,  with  the  elder  Winthrop,  in  "  the  un- 
warrantableness  and  unsafeness  of  referring  matter  of  counsel 
or  jurisdiction  to  the  body  of  the  people."     But  the  disintegra- 

9  Exclusive  of  the  town  of  Burlington,  which  made  no  returns.  The 
vote  by  towns  is  printed  with  the  Journal  of  the  Convention  (pp.  117, 
118),  from  the  official  returns. 


FEDERAL   AND    REPUBLICAN    COMMENTS.  6l 

tion  of  the  old  federal  party  had  been  going  on  for  years,  and 
much  of  its  strength  had  been  transferred  —  not  directly  to  re- 
publicanism, but  —  to  the  cause  of  "  toleration  and  reform,"  be- 
fore the  constitution  was  framed.  The  standard  bearers  of  that 
cause,  in  its  first  substantial  victories,  were  taken  from  the  fed- 
eral ranks.  The  influence  of  the  federal  element  in  the  conven- 
tion made  itself  felt  in  every  article  of  the  constitution.  The  re- 
sult, as  we  have  seen,  was  not  entirely  satisfactory  to  radical  re- 
publicans, —  some  of  whom  complained  that  this  instrument  was 
"  a  mere  embodiment  of  the  charter  of  1662."  Federalists  of 
the  old  school  did  not  so  regard  it.  The  editor  of  the  Connecti- 
cut Mirror  (William  L.  Stone),  in  a  review  of  the  political  situa- 
tion in  October,  1818,  mourned  for  the  departed  glory  of  the 
State : 

"  Our  venerable  customs,  usages,  and  laws,  have  been  assailed 
with  more  than  vandal  rudeness ;  our  form  of  government,  under 
which  for  near  two  hundred  years  we  have  enjoyed  privileges 
and  blessings  unknown  to  any  other  people  upon  earth,  has  been 
swept  away,  as  it  were  by  the  first  surge  of  the  tempest,  and  we 
are  left  upon  the  ocean  of  experiment,  under  the  direction  of 
officers  possessing,  with  perhaps  one  or  two  exceptions,  neither 
skill  nor  capacity." 

The  Hartford  Times  —  which,  under  the  editorship  of  John  M. 
Niles,  had  been  one  of  the  most  efficient  promoters  of  the  politi- 
cal revolution  10  —  summing  up,  at  the  close  of  the  year,  the  im- 
mediate results  of  the  victory  won  by  the  party  of  constitution 
and  reform,  expressed  the  satisfaction  which,  with  the  before- 
mentioned  exceptions,  the  republicans  felt  in  their  success : 

"  This  charter  is  not  only  valuable  for  the  rights  which  it  se- 
cures, but  also  from  the  difficulties  which  have  attended  the  sub- 
ject, the  perseverance  which  it  discloses,  and  the  evidence  which 
it  affords  of  the  sure,  but  slow  progress  of  light  and  intelligence, 
of  liberal  sentiments,  and  of  the  ultimate  establishment  of  the 
empire  of  reason  and  philosophy  on  earth.  It  is  the  product  of 
more  than  fourteen  years,  and  during  most  of  this  period  it  has 
been  like  a  ray  of  light  enveloped  in  clouds  and  darkness  —  the 

'".Mr.  Niles  embarked  in  these  reformatory  measures  with  zeal,  energy, 
and  ability;  and  more  than  any  other  man.  perhaps,  contributed  to  the 
revolution  of  parties  which  followed.  To  forward  his  views,  and  give 
them  efficiency,  he  with  the  co-operation  of  others  established  the  Hart- 
ford Times,  in  January,  1817,  a  paper  that  acquired  an  immediate  local 
position  and  influence."  —  Hon.  Gideon  Welles,  communicated  to  Stiles's 
History   of   Windsor,   p.    727. 


62  THE   IMMEDIATE    RESULTS. 

impervious  gloom  of  prejudice,  in  part  the  relic  of  former  times, 
and  partly  the  offspring  of  the  juggling  and  delusion  of  political 
and  clerical  craftsmen." 

******* 

'  The  rights  of  conscience  are  secured  and  established,  the 
adulterous  union  of  church  and  state  dissolved,  legal  religion 
abolished,  and  the  religion  of  the  heart  encouraged,  a  powerful 
motive  to  hypocrisy  removed,  grace  left  free  to  all  '  without 
money  and  without  price,'  and  the  primitive  rights  of  Christianity 
restored.  A  government  of  men  has  been  superseded  by  a  gov- 
ernment of  laws  founded  upon  a  Constitution;  a  system  of  cus- 
toms or  steady  Jiabits,  established  without  the  consent  of  the 
people  and  maintained  against  their  will,  has  been  discarded ; 
distinct  and  independent  bodies  of  magistracy  have  been  con- 
stituted, their  powers  and  duties  defined,  limited,  and  separated, 
and  their  proceedings  required  to  be  public. 

"  The  rights  of  suffrage  have  been  recognized  and  established 
upon  just  and  liberal  principles,  excluding  all  qualifications  but 
those  of  a  personal  nature;  the  election  laws  new  modified,  ren- 
dering the  mode  of  voting  convenient  and  expeditious,  pro- 
visions made  for  a  correct  return  and  counting  of  the  votes,  the 
infamous  '  stand-up  law '  repealed,  the  system  of  nomination, 
that  wonderful  invention  of  political  empirics,  whereby  the  same 
public  officers  were  chosen  twice  over,  abolished,  and  semi- 
annual elections,  which  were  a  great  and  unnecessary  burden  to 
the  freemen,  have  been  discontinued,  and  an  annual  election 
established. 

"  The  sessions  of  the  General  Assembly  have  been  reduced  to 
one  in  a  year,  thereby  saving  about  $14,000  annually ;  the  su- 
perior and  county  courts  reorganized,  and  the  number  of  judges 
reduced  nearly  one-half,  which  will  proportionately  reduce  the 
expense.  The  salary  of  the  Commissioners  of  the  School  Fund 
has  been  reduced  $500 ;  arrangements  made  to  place  those  funds 
which  were  in  a  very  neglected  and  ruinous  condition,  in  a  safe 
situation  ;  the  duties  of  the  treasurer  and  commissioner  of  the 
school  fund  separated  and  regulated ;  and  a  system  of  taxation, 
founded  upon  just  and  liberal  principles,  nearly  perfected,  and 
will  undoubtedly  be  adopted  at  the  next  session.  These  are 
some  of  the  changes  which  characterize  the  last  year." 


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